The Full Circle
by A2MOM
Summary: The War has taken Encke Full Circle. Set after Cold and Lonely in the Night, and before The Great Rebuilding. M for sex , graphic descriptions of war, and dark themes. Encke centric with everyone else, multiple pairings and OC's
1. Chapter 1

Notes:

Hamletmachine created and owns Starfighter, no profit is being made from this story.

* * *

_Full Circle_ follows a specific arc in the stories I have written. It will not make sense if you read it first!

Here is the Arc:

_Task name Encke_

_KP_

_First Impressions_

_The Next Twenty-Four_

_Some Things_

_Cold and Lonely in the Night_

_Full Circle_

_The Great Rebuilding_

_Learning Curve_

* * *

Chapter 1

Kratos and Zelos are two of my OC's first seen in _My Alpha. _Callisto, Puck and Oberon are first seen in _The Next Twenty-Four._ Cassius is my name for Encke's second in command, the guy with scars on his face

* * *

A repetitive chime cut through the fog in Encke's brain. It nudged him reluctantly from sleep and the warmth of Keeler's bare back, which was spooned against Encke's t-shirt clad front. With a sigh, Encke rolled over enough to thumb the comm link by their bunk and blinked at the face peering at him on screen.

"Cass," he said, voice rough with too little sleep and too much irritation. "Somebody better be dead, if you're wakin' me up at 4 am."

His second in command closed his eyes as though in pain, and Encke came suddenly, fully awake.

"Sir," Cassius said bleakly, "somebody is."

* * *

"The attack came at 01:00 hours our time, just after 15:00 hours on colony 6. Three major settlements were destroyed by enemy fire; including a hospital and a local police department."

Bering looked back at the assembled group, looking as though he'd aged 10 years in the past few hours. "The Colteron Empire insists this was a random, rogue attack, a 'last gasp' as it were."

"Sir," Keeler spoke up, seated on Cook's right, nodding towards the schematics that displayed the horrific ruins of what had been a once prosperous colony, "If the Colterons had truly been planning to disrupt the upcoming Peace Treaty, wouldn't they have chosen a more vital target?"

"Three pm, on a colony full of families," Cassius spoke up from the back of the room, his voice and expression hollow. His wife and children lived there, and had been out of contact with him since just after the attack. "The kids are just getting out of school then, shifts changing at the hospital….Looks like the 'Teron's chose a pretty vital target to me."

Keeler flushed and fell silent, and Encke knew it was in deference to the agony Cassius must be going through right now, that no one reprimanded him for his lack of 'sir'.

"So, what does this mean, Commander Bering?' Abel spoke up, seated between Cain and Praxis at the table in briefing room one. "Are the Peace Talks….Has the war restarted?"

It was the question on everyone's minds, the question Encke had been dreading an answer to since he was pulled out of the safety of his bed just a few hours ago. Bering, however, was determined to put everyone's mind at ease.

"No, Abel, open hostilities have not resumed. The peace talks are still scheduled to commence at the end of this month." He paused, his dark eyes turning to Commander Cook.

"The_ Sleipnir_ has been ordered to remain stationed around Mars when we make orbit, instead of returning to Earth." Cook said; immaculate as always, though his eyes held as much strain as Bering's did. "We will provide defense in case of another attack, and personnel and supplies to assist with the relief efforts on the surface."

_So much for finally getting to see Earth_, Encke thought bitterly. Nearly everyone seated around the table was due to complete their tour of duty within the next 30 days, himself and Keeler included. The _Sleipnir_ was scheduled to be decommissioned and her crew to be released from service. This was all part of the job, however, and last minute hostile fire during wartime was unfortunately all too common place.

While Cook droned on about the classified plans—plans Puck had already downloaded to Keeler's tablet—Encke considered the reasons Cook and Bering would have for assembling this particular group of men.

Cain and Abel were a given, the _Reliant_ boasting one of the new, improved engines and her pilot and gunner among the best in the fleet. Deimos and Phobos he understood as well, the _Ares_ had a state of the art navigational orb in place, and Phobos; obnoxious as he was, had been one of a handful of navigators who had mastered the complex algorithms required to operate it. Tiberius, with Ethos at her helm, and Praxis on weapons had the best long range sensors and communications array.

The inclusion of Kratos and Zelos at such a highly classified meeting surprised him, until he recalled that Callisto had been injured recently, and was unable to pilot the _Veyron_. Her upgrades had recently rendered her inoperable by any pilot without a class five security clearance and at least 2,500 flight hours of experience. Other than Puck, Zelos was the only pilot aboard who met those conditions.

Keeler must have begged on bended knee to have Cook spare the life of his closest friend, allowing Puck to stay on board and be exempted from this mission. Encke knew why he and Keeler were included; the team needed a lead ship, plain and simple. Nothing special about either one of their abilities, save for the fact that every person in the room would follow their orders unquestioningly. Even into death.

Encke closed his eyes briefly, and wished, more than anything, that when he opened them, he'd still be back in his bunk, with Keeler.

* * *

"I want to marry you."

Keeler didn't even pause as he laid out his kit for their 08:00 flight exercises the following day. "That's nice, sweetheart; but you'll have to get in line. I've had at least three other proposals, and it's only Thursday."

Encke chuckled, content to remain in a lazy sprawl across their bed, sated from a particularly invigorating round of sex. Nothing like a near or pre-death experience, to put Keeler's already healthy libido into overdrive. "That so? So whose teeth I gotta knock in this week, baby?"

Pausing, Keeler tilted his head—his white blond hair just past chin length now, catching the overhead cabin lights and making him glow like an angel. His braid still lay in the dresser drawer with Encke's uniforms, just a few inches from Keeler's hands.

"Let's see; there was Ralph, in maintenance; Vicks, but I'm pretty sure he was high as a kite; and Anzo, the guy that always puts too much starch in my underwear down in the Laundry."

Encke was laughing before Keeler had even finished, and Keeler threw a grin over his bare shoulder, half dressed for bed in singlet and drawstring pajama pants.

"I had no idea," he drawled, rolling to his feet and padding across the floor naked to loop his arms around Keeler's waist from behind, "that I had such wicked competition for your affections, Baby…."

He pressed a kiss to the back of Keeler's neck when his lover bent to continue running through the checklist on his tablet. "Ralph's gotta outweigh even me by 25 kilos, and is half a head shorter, and bald-,"

Keeler wordlessly reached a hand back and ran his palm none too gently over Encke's mostly shorn scalp, making them both laugh. "….Vicks' is straight as the day is long, and Anzo's old enough to be your granddaddy."

Keeler turned in the circle of Encke's arms, laying his hands on his lover's bare chest. "You're forgetting, I proposed to you first, doofus. Remember? Before I shipped out on the Excelsior?"

"Yeah and I'm still waitin' on that ring, by the way," Encke said wrly. "Maybe if you don't get crackin', I'll just take ol' Anzo up on his offer instead."

* * *

It should have been an uneventful last few weeks in space, but with the added pressure of the attack on Colony 6, tempers were frayed, with everything from petty squabbles to serious fights erupting every day. Cassius wasn't the only person aboard with loved ones unaccounted for on the ruined colony, and morale, when it should have been high, was at low ebb. There was a spike in stress related injuries and illnesses too, especially amongst the navigators, who were less resistant to physiological stress than the fighters generally were.

Encke watched Keeler sleep more and eat less as the days dragged on. The price that humans paid, for venturing into space, was becoming all too clear.

* * *

"Move over!" Zelos snapped, shoving Kratos painfully in the side as the wiry Fighter plunked his breakfast tray on the mess hall table. "You do not need to seet on top of me,_ lourdaud_ !"

Kratos scowled, cursing under his breath and glaring petulantly at his Navigator. "_You_ take up too much room; always too much room; leave your smelly clothes all over the floor and cigarette butts on my side of the sink. _You_ move over, if I am crowding you so much you—"

"_Tais-toi, bébé_!" Zelos snapped, and shot Kratos a withering glance. "_Merde_, but my head hurts," he complained, rubbing his eyes. "Your snoring kept me awake all night; must you sleep weeth your nose all the time een my ear?"

Kratos glared at him and at the table at large, hunching down and starting to shovel food into his mouth. "_Shinjimae,"_ he muttered, crumbs spraying as he chewed noisily, face scarlet.

Ethos sighed. "Oh, you two are always so cute together! Just like an old married couple."

"In that case," Cain rolled his eyes, "remind me to never get married." He grinned at Abel, stealing a segment of the orange Abel had just spent the last five minutes meticulously peeling. "We'll just live in sin, right, Princess?"

"Keep stealing my food and you won't live til the end of the day," Abel retorted, pulling his plate out of reach, and even Kratos grinned at that.

Encke entered the mess with Cassius, both in their flight suits conversing low and seriously. Encke clapped Cassius on the back and gave him a reassuring smile before the tall sergeant veered off. Cassius looked strained, and didn't smile back.

"Any word, sir?" Cain asked quietly as Encke joined the group at the table.

Encke's shook his head bleakly. "No, son. Cass' been trying to reach Jaleesa all morning but communications are still out on colony 6, except for the Crisis Center."

He looked around the table and continued before anyone could question him further. "Okay, people; our flight window is coming up in less than half an hour. I need my Fighter's in the Hangar bay at 07:45, sharp. Keeler wants the Navigators to meet him at the lab, same time. Eat up, gentlemen; time is short."

He strode off, leaving an uneasy silence around the table. Phobos glanced at Deimos morosely. "You know I really thought we were about done with this crap. Shit, I need a cigarette. Too bad I don't smoke."

Cain made a face. "Yeah, well I do. C'mon Kratos, you in?"

"Hai," Kratos nodded, clambering back off the bench and starting to gather up his tray and utensils. Wordlessly, Zelos pushed his used tray in Kratos' direction, ignoring his Fighter's scowl as he grudgingly snatched that up too.

Zelos bent his head, frowning again as he closed his eyes. "Merde," he repeated softly, rubbing the furrow in his brow as though in pain.

Kratos hesitated, shifting both trays to one hand and laying the other on Zelos' back. "Vous malade; Sweet boy?" he asked, the French sounding incongruous in his heavy Japanese accent.

"…._Va, je vais bien_," Zelos murmured, shrugging off his hand slightly. "_Cesser de_ _s'inquiéter, Amoureux_." _("I am okay; stop worrying, lover.")_

Abel saw Kratos' fearsome scowl crease into a worried frown. He hesitated, as though he would say more, than seemed to think better of it. He turned finally, slouching off to meet Cain in the kitchen alcove for a smoke.

Praxis and Deimos trailed off to join their fellow fighters, leaving Abel, Phobos, Ethos and Zelos alone.

"So, Zelos," Phobos started conversationally, stirring his coffee. "Just how big is Kratos' dick anyway?"

Ethos' eyes looked as if they would bug out of his head in shock. Exasperated, Abel kicked Phobos under the table.

"Why are you such a pig, anyway, Phobos? What an awful thing to say."

Zelos blithely sipped his coffee while Phobos looked pointedly at Abel. "Kratos is an awful person. I can't think of any other reason Zel would keep him around, unless he's hung like a horse." Phobos turned back to Zelos, waiting. "Well?"

"_Enorme_," Zelos admitted with a shrug, making Ethos giggle. " "E has….how do you say eet…_dure longtemps_, um, 'Endurance'?"

He trailed off, closing his eyes again, and Abel exchanged a look with Phobos.

"Zelos, if you're not feeling well, I'm sure Keeler would-,"

"Fine; I am fine," Zelos snapped irritably. "Too much talking, let's go."

They stood, Zelos swaying a bit and pressing his fingertips to the table to steady himself.

"You okay?" Ethos asked, touching his arm lightly, and Zelos shook his head as if to clear it.

"Stood up too fast," he murmured, blinking, and then drew himself upright. Abel could see that he was very pale. Phobos casually moved to walk closely by his side, and for once, Zelos didn't complain.

As they neared the entrance to the mess, Zelos staggered, and only Phobos' quick reflexes kept him from falling to the floor.

"Zelos; what-?" Abel blurted, alarmed. Zelos wasn't pale anymore, he was blue.

"A-bel," Zelos gasped, bewildered. He was shaking, and Ethos moved quickly to help Phobos support him on his other side. "Something….something ees wrong…."

"I'm calling medical," Abel said tightly, darting over to the comm link, but Zelos shook his head, sweat pouring down his face. "Phobos, Ethos! Get him back to the table-!"

"No—no time; please," he gasped louder, eyes glazed. "_Aidez-moi, s'il vous plait_, Kratos; Kratos, help me….!"

And then he fell, just collapsed, before Phobos or Ethos could stop him; crumpling like a rag doll, and was dead before he even hit the floor. For a split second, Abel stared in horror, until training kicked in.

"Fuck!" Ethos gasped, kneeling swiftly even as Phobos was running in the direction the fighters had gone, yelling Kratos' name as loud as he could. Abel was on the ground, tearing open Zelos' jacket and feeling for a carotid pulse he knew he wouldn't find. Ethos tipped Zelos head back and tried in vain to blow life against his cold, blue lips.

"No pulse," Abel gritted out between his clenched teeth, positioning his hands over his teammate's sternum and starting compressions, one-and-two-and; hearing Ethos muffled sobs as he begged Zelos to breathe, please breathe! Dimly registering he'd never heard Ethos say so much as 'dammit' until now….Six-and-seven-and-

"Move," Phobos barked, kneeling alongside Abel and slapping the portable AED pads against Zelos' clammy chest. Abel shifted to the side as he continued compressions, up down ten-and-eleven-and- please, please Zelos, please don't—

"No;NO! _Kudasai; kudasaiiii—ieeee_ —no! Zelos- Sweet Boy, No! Let me go to him, let me—!"

It took all three of them, Deimos, Cain and Praxis to restrain Kratos as medical rushed in, barking orders and pushing everyone out of the way. The room was full of people suddenly, and noise, Cook and Bering there, demanding answers; Keeler watching, sickened, as Ethos sobbed in his arms. Phobos sat alone at the table, where they'd all laughed and watched Zelos bickering with Kratos not fifteen minutes ago, knees drawn up to his chest, shaking.

Abel hadn't even realized Encke had arrived too, until Cain was there with him, crouched beside him just like when they'd watched Hermes die in the hangar bay, less than six months ago. Abel wasn't crying this time but Cain held him anyway, both of them clinging to each other while Deimos and Praxis both went to comfort Phobos. Abel watched, numb, as Zelos' body jerked with each jolt from the AED, flopping like a dead fish out of water, lifeless and limp.

It seemed to go on forever. They tried everything, the rapid response team arriving with a full arrest cart and starting two intravenous lines through which they pushed a myriad of drugs, all of which failed to restart Zelos' heart. Most of the terms were gibberish to Abel—'V-tach', 'Asystole', an 'Amp of Epi'-—the Alliance providing only basic Life Support and Field Aid courses to Navigators and Fighters alike.

And throughout it all. Kratos, one of the least likable men Abel had ever known, cried and begged to be allowed to go to his Navigator, his lover. Abel had never imagined their relationship to be anything more than a violent sexual attraction. According to Cain, Kratos showed up to training most days with as many bruises as Zelos did. But Kratos' pleas were heart wrenching; he sat at one of the tables with his head down, fists in his wild hair, alternating between wailing and terrified staring. Encke sat with him, Cassius on his other side, half embracing, half restraining him.

"Time," the lead Medic sighed, signaling for the rapid response team to stop their fruitless efforts. He made a notation on the data pad and spoke a few low words to his crew. Abel caught the words 'body bag' with a sick feeling of dread.

"Commander?" Encke asked, and Bering nodded, waving the medics back. Encke spoke quietly to Kratos who shook his head at first, eyes huge and frightened.

"C'mon, Baby, you can do this," Encke said lowly, Bering coming forward to help him and Cassius all but drag Kratos to Zelos' inert form. Now that Zelos was beyond help, Kratos seemed terrified to touch him. "You gotta say goodbye to him, Baby, we'll help you."

Slowly, Kratos went to his knees beside his Navigator, and reached a shaking hand toward his face.

"Sweet boy," he sobbed, pulling the limp body, head lolling and limbs boneless, into his arms. "My-my Sweet boy." He shook, crying; everyone was crying except Abel, too numb to feel anything other than icy cold shock.

"Please, can't you," Kratos lifted his head to beg the Medics, who watched with grim sorrow, "can't you wake him up? Please, can't you just….just try a little more….?" He crushed Zelos to his chest, weeping anew and keening, "_Aishiteru….Aishiteru; kudasai_, please, don't leave me all alone; please Sweet Boy, I love you…."

* * *

Sudden Cardiac Death Syndrome, they called it, and Encke's eyes kept straying to Keeler's haggard face, watching him barely holding himself together later in the briefing room, as Puck bravely smiled and assured Commander Cook he and Oberon would be honored to join the mission. Was he looking at his own lover's future, watching Zelos' lifeless body being sealed inside a body bag? Was he looking at his own fate too, in Kratos' distraught posture and tear-streaked face, hunched with misery as he was led to sickbay for a sedative with Praxis and Ethos at his side.

Zelos had always unnerved Encke, so alike in looks to his former lover and navigator, Aaron. They were nothing alike in temperament, however, and for all of Zelos' insults and sniping he never looked at anyone other than Kratos. It unsettled Encke, the reality of Aaron walking back into his life flaring like a guilty spark of hope in his chest. Wondering, if Aaron had, how he could ever decide between his first love, and Keeler.

* * *

As most of you know I am a nurse. Kratos' plea 'can't you wake him up?' is a sad, but true, story; as is the manner of Zelos' death.

* * *

This is my second attempt to post this story. If I can manage to post chapters here, you'll get the rest...! There are probably 10 more chapters to go :)-A2MOM


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

* * *

"How does that even happen?" Ethos asked, seated on the side of Praxis' bunk later that night. "I mean; we all just had physicals, and Zelos had an A1 rating, just like I did-,"

"He also smoked like a chimney, drank like a fish and had an ex-junkie for a fuck-buddy," Praxis said mildly, starting to strip for bed.

"Poor Kratos," Ethos said softly, looking at his hands. "One of the last things he said to Zelos was 'drop dead'-Shinjiame. I can't imagine how guilty he must be feeling right now."

Praxis looked at him quizzically, and Ethos blushed. "I, um, had a roommate at the academy who was half-Japanese; Andrew. He, um, he taught me a…few things…"

He was beet red by the time he finished, and Praxis couldn't suppress a chuckle. "I bet he did." He sat beside Ethos, studying the younger man's dejected posture with sympathy. "Hey, Ethos; look at me."

Reluctantly Ethos did, eyes too pale and round in his sweet face. It had been hard, losing Jackson—confident, beautiful, erotic—and then being handed Ethos for a Navie in his place. Short and plain where Jackson had been muscular and tall, shy where Jackson had been a dedicated extrovert, Praxis had had an awful time making the adjustment—and making Ethos feel welcome at all.

Gradually, the ice between them thawed; until one night, trading stories about their childhoods, Praxis told Ethos about his abusive father. And haltingly, Ethos had spoken of his first fighter, Pathos; a man who said he loved him then beat him, swore he couldn't live without him, then forced him to sleep in the cold corridor if he so much as glanced at another fighter.

When they were partnered, Praxis already had a lover, Phobos, for which Ethos was profoundly glad. If Ethos had any romantic interests—he did seem to hang around with Bazin a lot-Praxis never knew.

Praxis had lost all of his brothers to the war, and Ethos had never had any to begin with. Now, it was obvious Ethos needed a little brotherly advice.

"Look at me," Praxis repeated, giving Ethos' forearm a squeeze. He sighed, looking at Ethos' unhappy face. "You did everything you could. You and Abel and Phobos; but Zelos was beyond help. I remember a guy arrested in basic, first week of training. Just collapsed on the track in the middle of laps; boom. Big, strong farm boy, and it was me doing compressions and the Sergeant doing mouth to mouth til the medics arrived. I carried that guilt around with me a long time, even though we found out later he'd had a heart defect from birth. Sometimes, guys get passed through their entrance physicals if they look strong as an ox on the outside."

But Ethos was quiet too long, thinking obviously of something else. "I've heard other stuff too; stuff they tried to hide from us at the Academy."

He looked up at Praxis, his sweet face troubled. "They say the Orbs are toxic…That a lot of the navigators, like Cal, that have served too long end up with all kinds of medical problems later on. And space is just….full of all this radiation, and the Starfighters aren't really meant to withstand it like the battleships are."

Praxis lounged back on his bunk, thinking of the things he'd heard about the Navigators themselves. All the gene splicing that made them blond and graceful and intelligent also made them less resistant to certain illnesses. Fighters were generally of colonial stock; if you'd survived the colonies and grown into a man strong enough to be an Alliance Fighter, you could survive just about anything.

Ethos twisted his hands in his lap, looking inward. "We've all been out here too long; I—I really thought the war was over, and then this last attack came, right before we could make it home."

"We're going to make it home, Ethos," Praxis assured him. Ethos looked at him then, so sweet and young and hopeful that Praxis prayed it wasn't all just a pack of lies he was spouting. "Do you know what you want to do then?"

"I want to stay Career Military," Ethos said, with the type of determination to make a difference Praxis had once felt as well. "I'd like to teach, at the Academy if possible."

Praxis smiled, patting his friend's knee. "You'd be a great teacher, Ethos. You're already a great pilot, and you've got a shit load of combat experience now, too. You have a lot of knowledge to share"

Ethos blushed, ducking his head with a bashful smile. "Thanks…you always cheer me up, Praxis. What do you think you'd like to do? I mean, do you have any plans yet, for after the war?"

After the War…it seemed like an unobtainable goal that might finally be coming within reach. If the goddamn Colterons could quit shooting up the colonies and killing people, that is. "I think I'd like to be a doctor….It'd be nice to heal people, instead of blowing them up."

He looked at Ethos expectantly; he hadn't really told anyone except Phobos, who had at least refrained from laughing in his face.

But Ethos' smile was genuine. "Wow that's great, Praxis; you're so gentle, you'd be a great doctor!" He smiled, looking truly happy. "Do you think…? I mean, would you, um, get your eye fixed, too?"

Praxis shrugged. "I dunno; I thought it kinda gave me character," he smirked, snapping the band on his eye patch. Ethos just rolled his eyes, and Praxis chuckled. "Yeah, but it's a big, complicated process to clone an eye. Solid organs and even limbs are a lot easier. The rehab afterward is pretty intense too; it's like teaching your brain to learn to see all over again."

"Oh," Ethos said faintly, searching his face with his own, light blue eyes. "I never thought about it that way." He broke off, looking uncomfortable again.

"I hope, that we can keep in touch," he said softly. "I mean all of us, you and me, Abel and Encke and Keeler and everyone. We've gone through so much together, and I just feel like you're all a part of my family now."

His eyes were bright with tears by the time he'd finished, and Praxis swallowed back a lump in his own throat.

"I promise you, Ethos," he said quietly, squeezing his friend's shoulder with his large hand, "I'll never say 'have a nice life' to you. I could never walk away from any of you guys, you're all way too important to me, too."

Ethos smiled. "Cain too?"

"Ah yeah, especially Cain. I can't wait to see the look on his face when I do get a new eye, and he can't call me 'Cyclops' anymore!"


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Warnings: This chapter deals with mental illness and suicide. It is graphic, and very, very dark. Don't read it in the dark alone at night

Notes: Encke was promoted to Commander in Cold and Lonely in the Night. It's confusing, because Cook and Bering are Commanders too, when they probably should be Captains.

* * *

_You will only be good at two things in your life_, Otousan once told Kratos. _Breaking the law, and breaking Okaasan's heart._

Kratos was still Takeshi then; barely sixteen, an ugly, illiterate, disappointment with a bad temper and a schizoaffective disorder. He set fires, vandalized and stole; ran with street gangs and prostituted himself for drugs. Okaasan cried and tried to cure him with guilt and love; Otousan with a belt and the back of his hand. The family didn't need him; they had Jun, his shy younger brother, and Hikari, his sweet baby sister.

* * *

Takeshi was twelve when the Dark Man first came. He was a bent old man with a ragged kimono and a gnarled walking stick, silent and watching. Takeshi asked Otousan who the Dark Man was, why he stood at the end of the futon where Takeshi and Jun slept each night, staring at them with glittering eyes. The Dark Man hurt Jun, sometimes; pressing his face into the bedding so that he could not breathe, sending him crying in terror to Okaasan's arms. Kratos still carried the scars from the beating Otousan gave him, when he tried to convince his father a stranger had hurt his sweet, seven year old brother; not him.

As Takeshi grew older, the Dark Man came more frequently. He stood straighter, the walking stick no longer in his hand. He talked to the teenage boy sometimes, whispering in his ear as he stood beside his sleeping parent's bed, a butcher knife in his hand. He laughed when Takeshi took Jun to the beach in the summer to search for shells, and nearly let him drown. When the Dark Man told him to take his four year old baby sister from her bed, and touch her, Takeshi ran away from home.

He met a new friend, and her name was Heroin. She was a sensual mistress and when she flowed warm and comforting into his veins, the Dark Man stayed away. Takeshi would do anything to please his new friend; stealing or getting on his knees in back alleys; running drugs for the local Yakuza. He overdosed, was taken in for treatment; sent home to his family, sullen and resentful.

* * *

When Takeshi turned eighteen, he saw the Dark Man for the last time, and he finally understood. The Dark Man wore his face, and stared back at him from the mirror over the bathroom sink. Horrified, Takeshi broke the mirror, took the shards, and slit his wrists. When the paramedics transported him to the hospital, screaming and bloody, his father wept, for the first time that Takeshi could remember. After his 90 day stint in a psychiatric rehab, Takeshi returned to an empty house. His father had wisely packed up the family and all of their belongings, and fled.

* * *

By the age of 25, Takeshi was a career criminal, arrested for assault and facing serious prison time. The War in Space was desperate for men, however, and so Takeshi took the easier option, and joined the Alliance instead. It was just another gang; a new set of Bosses to serve, a new set of men to fight and fuck. The Alliance gave him food, and medication, and a sense of respect. The Dark Man was finally gone, dead and buried.

The Alliance also gave him a new name, Kratos; and a new navigator; a foul mouthed, hot tempered beauty named Zelos. They fought constantly, unless they were fucking; flew through space and smote fire like the winged ancestral Dragons of old Japan. Zelos could out smoke, out fight and out drink Kratos. He tied him to their bunk and rode him until they both screamed, and poor Puck and Oberon in the cabin next door had to beat on the wall, and yell for them to shut up. Kratos called him Sweet Boy. For the first time in his life, Kratos was in love.

* * *

"I don't want you to be alone tonight, Son," the Commander told him, his deep voice rough with sadness. "Me and Cass, we'll bunk in with you 'til the memorial service in the morning. Doctor gave you something to help you sleep, right?"

"Hai," Kratos said quietly. He had cried so much, his head was pounding, with guilt as well as grief. "Sir, I respectfully beg forgiveness, for my shameful behavior in the—the mess hall today. " Kratos bent his head, humiliated and sick with longing.

The Commander made it worse, by actually pulling him against his solid chest in a manly embrace. The Sergeant came too, sick at heart because his woman and babies were still lost on Colony 6. Still professional enough to care for his men first, though; both of them real Men, good men that would have made Okaasan smile, made Otousan proud. The type of man Kratos would never be.

They slept; Kratos in the bed that smelled of his Sweet boy, pressing his face into the pillow and silently weeping. The Sergeant tossed and turned above him, the Commander stretched out on the floor, exhausted and asleep within minutes. Kratos must have slept as well, because sometime later, a soft voice was speaking in his ear, rousing him from disturbing dreams.

"Do it now, while they sleep," the Dark Man whispered, voice a seductive caress in his ear. "They let your Sweet boy die. They are going to let you die, too."

Kratos sat on the edge of his bunk, looking down on the Commander's sleeping face. The Commander still had his pale Angel, all long limbs and white hair like a halo about his head. "He doesn't care about you; he's only doing his duty. Kill him, quickly before the other one wakes, and then kill him, too. Go find the Angel, and desecrate him. It's what they all deserve, for letting your Sweet boy die."

Kratos looked at the length of rope twisted around his hands. He could strangle the Commander; kill him and watch the light fade from his beautiful amber eyes. His knife could slip through the throat of the Sergeant like it was melted butter. The Yakuza had taught him just where to make the slash; to make a man bleed; to make it hurt.

"Do it, Takeshi; do not hesitate," the Dark Man urged. "Do it for your Sweet boy-"

"My Sweet boy is dead," Kratos said softly into the darkness. He turned, seeing fear for the first time in the Dark Man's eyes. "And so are you."

* * *

A few years ago, Takeshi could have slipped a needle into his vein and let an overdose of bliss float him into forever silence, where all was calm and the Dark Man couldn't reach him. But not even Vicks had access to those types of drugs, and Takeshi was long dead, anyway. It was time for Kratos to find some silence, too.

Most of the crew was asleep. The maintenance walkway where he and Zelos had once hid, Zelos' athletic legs wrapped around Kratos' back as Kratos pounded him into the cold titanium hull, was thankfully deserted. Kratos never asked why Zelos liked pain so much; inflicting or receiving, it didn't seem to matter. Both made the beautiful boy with the teal green eyes scream in ecstasy, crushing their mouths together as they came. Kratos had had sex with scores of people; male, female, in every combination imaginable. But no one had ever kissed him, before Zelos.

The rope caught the conduit over head on his third toss. Not giving himself any time to think about it, he slipped the noose he'd made over his head, stepped up onto the railing, and dropped soundlessly over the side.

It didn't happen as quickly as he'd hoped, and it didn't happen without a brief flare of terrifying agony. Helplessly, Kratos convulsed and kicked, mouth gaping ever wider in a desperate fight for air. Tears ran down his swollen, purple face, urine drenching his leg as he spun in a frantic circle, vision blurring at the edges, pinpoints of grey crowding out the machinery of the engine room. The quiet whirr of the vents mocking him was the last sound he heard, as his airway collapsed and his lungs gave up their fight for air.

Footsteps, growing louder, and he opened his eyes, dreading the moment when the Dark Man would finally claim his putrid soul. Instead, two strong hands caressed his face.

"Hush, eets over," Zelos assured him softly, wiping the tears from Kratos' ugly face with his elegant hands. "Eets done. No more pain."

"I-," Kratos gulped, feeling solid ground under his boots. "Am I dead-?"

He started to turn his head, but Zelos stopped him, holding his face firmly and shaking his head. "_Non_, do not look back, _Amoureux_. I do not want you to see."

Kratos nodded, obedient as he always was with his Sweet Boy. Zelos smiled sadly as Kratos put his arms around him, staring at him in disbelief.

"_Imbécile_," Zelos murmured, searching his face with his eyes. "Why?"

"I could not live without you, " Kratos said brokenly, tears sliding down his cheeks. "I love you. I love you, Ze-"

"-Jean-Michel," Zelos whispered against his lips. "My name is Jean-Michel, Takeshi."

"Jean-Michel," Kratos echoed softly, and was rewarded with a kiss. When they pulled apart, Zelos smiled, and took his hands.

"Let's go," he said simply.

"Where?" Kratos asked, and Zelos rolled his eyes, tugging at his hands.

"Do not ask so many questions!" Zelos ordered, mock haughty, tossing his head of strawberry blond hair. "I am the Navigator, _non_? You go wherever I say."

His lush mouth was turned up in a naughty grin, and Kratos smiled back. "_Hai_," he said, happy at last. "I will go."

At the doorway Kratos hesitated, looking beseechingly at his lover. "Please?" he asked. "I must know."

Zelos nodded, and Kratos looked back over his shoulder. The Dark Man swung slowly from the rope, sightless eyes staring at nothing, swollen tongue protruding from his cruel mouth. Kratos heaved a sigh of relief, knowing he would never hear that whispering voice again. He turned back to Zelos, who was regarding him with a smile.

"Ready, Takeshi?" Zelos asked softly, his fingers entwined with Kratos' and giving a gentle squeeze

Kratos nodded. "_Hai_, Sweet boy." He brought their joined hands to his mouth, and kissed the pale, slender fingers tenderly. "It is time for us both to go."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

* * *

Notes: Miles first appears in _The Great Rebuilding_

Marcus is my 'real' name for Cassius

* * *

Jaleesa shifted restlessly on the cot in the crowded gymnasium, rubbing her swollen belly as she tried to find a more comfortable position to sleep. Thank God the high school hadn't been hit; at least they had the gym and auditoriums for emergency evacuation shelters. Not the most comfortable place, when you were pregnant and had three kids already, but it would do.

The home she and Marcus had lived in for almost eight years was gone; everything they'd owned, gone. She'd escaped with the clothes on her back, one of their dogs; a yellow lab named Bonnie-who was pregnant just like she was-and the data discs for Marcus, herself and their three children.

Still, it could have been so much worse.

"Mama," her big girl, ten-year old Zoe, asked, "can Miles come sit with us? He's really scared. He said the police can't find his mom or dad yet, and his big brother's missing, too."

"Oh that's so sad, honey; you go tell him to come on over here and I'll look after him til his folks are found."

Zoe smiled happily and ran off to the other side of the gym. A group of children played under the watchful eye of one of the relief workers. Zoe came back moments later with a sweet but frightened looking child of about ten or eleven, with short brown hair and big, brown eyes.

"Thank you, Mrs. Wilson," Miles said quietly when she passed him a bottled juice and sandwich packet. He was so small, his eyes too large in his hollow face. His home, Jaleesa knew, had been at the epicenter of the attack.

Jaleesa frowned slightly as the baby kicked again; a boy this time after three girls, she'd just found out yesterday. Hadn't even told Marcus yet, and now no one could get word anywhere, let alone to a Battleship on a classified mission. She looked in dismay at the lost little boy, at Zoe chatting and smiling with him, making the whole thing one big adventure as children are wont to do. Next to them, six year old Mariah lay sleeping, sucking her thumb, and three year old Lakeisha next to her, curled into a little nest of borrowed blankets with a teddy bear under her arm.

How she was going to be able to take care of all of them, in an emergency shelter while six months pregnant, she had no idea.

"Mama, can Miles and I have a sleepover? Just until his mom and dad get back?'

Jaleesa looked at her daughter's little dark face, so much like Marcus', and the pale little boy next to her, and smiled through her fears.

"Of course you can, honey. " Oh yes, things could so very, very much worse.

* * *

"Ah, son of a bitch-!"

Encke came quickly awake; the shards of a dream filled with wailing and blood falling away from him like broken glass. Years of military training brought him instantly alert, and he knew, before he'd even looked at Kratos' empty bed, what he'd find. It was still an infuriating disappointment, Encke swearing much more eloquently than Cassius had, hauling himself stiffly to his feet from his sleeping position on the unforgiving floor. The two officers exchanged a miserable look.

* * *

It took less than an hour to find Kratos' body, that being the unfortunate discovery of a maintenance tech who'd reported early for duty. Encke looked on the ghastly corpse with a sickened heart. He couldn't think of any worse way to die, than being slowly strangled to death.

"It wasn't your fault-," Keeler started, tentatively laying a comforting hand on his arm. "You tried, you and Cassius both. You know Kratos had a history of mental health problems."

"Yeah, and I should'a ordered him to sickbay, not tried to be the fuckin' hero Big Brother and fix every mess on my own." He ran a hand over his scalp, itchy where he hadn't even had time lately for a shave.

He looked at Keeler bleakly. "Some 'star-crossed lovers', huh baby? Think they're together, in whatever afterlife we got comin' up?'

Keeler made a non-committal shrug, walking slowly alongside Encke back to their offices at Central Command. Notification of Next of Kin; that would be the rest of Encke's morning. Fuck.

"Maybe, sweetheart," Keeler answered, yawning behind his hand. "I don't know how much I believe in an 'afterlife'. I always figured our life force was released at death and returned to the cosmos."

"Hmm. You always were big on recycling, weren't you, Baby?"

Keeler managed a smile that didn't quite meet his eyes. Encke hesitated outside Keeler's office door, hating the gaunt, bloodless look about his lover's normally healthy face. Three brutal months on the_ Excelsior_ had taken more of a toll on his lover than he'd like to admit. Encke desperately wanted this war to be over, before it killed them all without even sending them into battle.

"You look awful tired," Encke said with concern, hands cupping Keeler's thin face.

"Just couldn't sleep, without my Teddy," Keeler smiled back. He kissed Encke, a rare PDA which furthered Encke's belief that his lover was beyond fatigued. "Puck wasn't nearly as nice; said I just look plain awful, and to get my 'skinny ass' back to bed."

Encke chuckled. "Told you he was checkin' out your ass the other day."

Keeler let Encke fold him into a brief hug before pulling away and pulling himself together. "See you at the afternoon debriefing," he said, and disappeared behind his closed door.

* * *

Puck looked up from his desk as Encke passed . "Can you arrange for Kratos and Zelos' cabin to be cleaned and their personal affects boxed?" Encke asked Keeler's young assistant. "Before Keeler goes and does it himself?"

For once, the ever bouncy man was subdued. "A few of us are going to do that later, if that's alright with you, sir," Puck said, twisting his engagement ring around his finger.

He looked up at Encke; small and lost behind his too large computer station. "I'd rather Zel's friends did it, instead of the environmental service's staff."

He didn't mention anything about Kratos' friends; as far as Encke knew, Dante and Nero were the only ones he'd had, and they were both dead now, too.

"That's fine, son; take all the time you need," Encke said with a nod. Puck smiled bravely back, sad but dry-eyed, for which Encke was profoundly grateful.

"Thank you, sir." He hesitated, and then said, haltingly, "I-I also need to inform you of a change in ship's personnel. Two of the crew were married, by the ship's chaplain last night. I've updated their files, but as their commanding officer, I have to let you know too."

Encke scrubbed a hand over his eyes. This was another side effect of the current atmosphere of tension; crew getting hastily married to avoid being reassigned again should hostilities renew. Spousal concessions were given in such instances, and Encke couldn't say he hadn't thought about it for Keeler and himself. Only the need to give Keeler a proper wedding, with their families and friends present, had stopped him.

"God almighty," Encke sighed wearily, thinking of the high demand for divorce attorneys after the war was over. "Which two fools this time? Don't tell me Phobos finally got a lasso 'round poor Praxis?"

Puck looked miserable, unable to meet his eyes. "Um, no, Encke. It was Oberon, and me."

Encke stared at the tousled bent head, the pink-streaked bangs falling over the guilty blue eyes. Slowly, he sat down on the edge of Puck's desk. "Well. Well, uh, congratulations, Puck. I'm sure Keeler will-,"

"He's going to_ kill_ me!" Puck exclaimed, darting a frantic glance towards Keeler's closed door. "I-we wanted you to both be there, to stand up with us, but we'd been waiting for a spot for _days_ to see the chaplain; and one came up at almost 23:00 hours, and if we didn't take it who _knows_ when another one would come up?! I-I promised Keeler, but it was so late, and after Zelos dropping dead like that, Keeler was just so exhausted…."

Tears brimmed in his pretty eyes, but he did his best to keep his voice steady. "I'm sorry, Encke. It would have meant a lot, if you guys could have been there too."

A rushed, sterile exchange of vows, aboard a ship of war; not anyone's idea of a beautiful wedding. Certainly not a religious ceremony at all, which Oberon would have been truly desperate, to have given up.

" 'S'okay, Baby," Encke said gently, giving his hair a ruffle. "Who'd you get?'

Puck bit his lip. "Um, Bazin and Aramis have the cabin across the corridor from me and Obie. They were still up, so they came." He heaved a dramatic sigh. "We didn't even have time to change into our dress uniforms. I got married in my pajamas, and Obie had to use one of my toe rings for his wedding ring. Geez, could we get any trashier?"

Encke hid his chuckle behind his hand. "Gramma always told me, 'the weddin's just a party, the marriage is forever'." He raised an eyebrow. "Have a good honeymoon, at least?"

"Oh sure," Puck grinned, looking a bit more chipper. "Obie does this thing with his—"

"Well, I gotta get back to my office," Encke interrupted, sliding off the desk with an ungainly scramble. "Uh, tell Obie I said 'congrats' too, okay?"

"Oh! Okay, sweetie," Puck smiled warmly, giving Encke a little wave as he escaped to the relative safety of his cramped, but quiet, office.

* * *

The six of them ate lunch hurriedly and went to the quarters Zelos and Kratos had shared, cabin 324, last room on the end of the corridor.

"I'll warn your right now, it's a pigsty, guys," Puck said eyeing the scrap of paper in his hand and then keying in the door code. "Kratos and Zel with both slobs."

And yeah, it was pretty bad, Abel thought, making the quarters he and Cain shared look positively tidy in comparison. With the amount of strewn clothing, cigarette butts and general debris, it was hard to believe Cassius and Encke had been able to spend the night here with Kratos, before he took his own life.

"Dibs on the sex tapes, when we find them," Phobos grinned with gallows humor, trying to lighten up the eerie occasion.

Porthos rolled his eyes. "Figured you'd want the sex _toys_, Phobs," he said, he and Ethos moving towards the closet with a packing box. He ducked when Phobos lobbed a sock at him, grinning.

"Look, can we just do this as quick as possible and get out of here?" Abel asked, helping Bazin pitch some of Kratos' clothes into a box. He shuddered, looking around the room uneasily. "I keep feeling like we're being watched."

"You and me both," Puck agreed. He was going through the dresser drawers, nose wrinkled as he pulled out old candy wrappers and a half eaten donut, when he stopped.

"Oh," he said faintly, pulling a tablet out and setting it on the dresser top. "Oh wow; look at this, you guys."

"Ooo, did you find their sex tapes?" Phobos asked with interest. Abel could see Porthos scowl at him from across the room.

Puck ignored Phobos comment. "No, this is an orientation itinerary, for TransPlanetary Transit; and a lease for an apartment on Colony 7." He looked up, his usually perky expression clouded. "Looks like Zelos had a job waiting for him, after the war…..Kratos' name is on this lease, too."

"TransPlan is a pretty coveted gig," Bazin observed, folding a pair of jeans and laying them in the box. "And colony 7 is awful pricey. I can't believe Zelos got a job there."

"I can't believe he was going to stay with _Kratos_," Phobos said, making a face.

"Well, he was a pretty good pilot," Puck said with a shrug, thumb running along the edge of the tablet with a longing look on his face.

"Not as good as you," Ethos said quietly, and Puck blushed a little.

"Or Abel." Abel was surprised that had come out of Porthos' mouth, but when he saw the ugly color suffuse Phobos' face, he thought he understood why.

Puck shook his head. "Doesn't matter; they won't need this lease anymore," he said briskly, shoving the tablet in the box, but Abel could see his hands were slightly shaking.

They packed in relative silence for a bit, exclamations of disgust voiced by all when the inevitable box of sex toys was discovered by poor Ethos.

"There were ropes in there, too," he started, and Porthos held up a hand.

"Ah, TMI, Ethos, c'mon….!"

"I know, but;" he hesitated looking a little squeamish. "They say that's how Kratos died. He, um, hung himself."

"I heard it was an overdose," Abel put in. In reality there were probably a dozen or more different theories, ranging from slitting his throat to choking on his own vomit after an overdose of sleeping pills.

"No, Ethos is right, Kratos hung himself," Bazin said distractedly, seated on the floor and pulling garbage out from under the lower bunk bed. He squawked when a box of condoms came out. "I heard it from one of the medics in sickbay when I went in for my physical."

Puck shuddered. "I'd rather go quickly, like in the middle of battle. Just 'kaBoom!'; gone."

"But then Oberon would be gone too," Bazin observed. He sealed the box he had filled, peering under the bed again. "For heaven's sake, how did these two ever manage to pass a room inspection?" he muttered.

Puck frowned, but then gave a toss of his head and a little fake laugh. "Oh, Obie couldn't live without me anywho," he smirked.

"Yeah, you two are so friggin' married," Porthos groused.

Abel saw something like alarm flit across Puck's face, but then Phobos was glaring at Porthos again.

"What's wrong with that?" he snapped, pitching some luridly graphic porn discs in a box without even noticing them. Abel caught the title _Alliance Bears and Twinks_ , and then Phobos was arguing with Porthos again.

"Some people actually _want_ to stay in a committed relationship," he went on, one hand one his hip. "Praxis and I have talked about it."

Porthos' face darkened. "Marriage is a dead institution," he snorted in disgust. "Humans weren't meant to mate for life."

"Swans do it," Phobos retorted, face blotchy with anger. "Lots of higher animals do, why shouldn't humans?"

"Yeah, so do vultures. You want to emulate an animal that eats road kill all its life? Be my guest."

Abel could see Ethos, standing behind Porthos' aggressively hunched form, his eyes straying from Porthos to Phobos uneasily. The tension was thick enough to cut with a knife, and Abel was surprised to see tears prick Phobos' eyes.

Porthos grabbed two of the packed boxes and headed for the door. "Takin' these to storage," he said shortly, and then the door was closing behind him. Abel had a feeling he wouldn't be back.

Phobos was looking down at the box he was filling, shaking. "Asshole," he hissed, humiliated and furious.

An uncomfortable silence followed the ugly scene, until Puck sighed, glancing around the room. "Okay, I think this is enough, guys. The rest of it just looks like garbage." He bit his lip, sharing a look with Abel as Phobos ignored everyone, busying himself with throwing several sets of lurid thong underwear in with the porn.

Abel and Puck did a quick check to see if anything important was left behind.

"Think either of their families will want these handcuffs?"

"I doubt it, Puck."

* * *

Phobos was silent until they were all in the lift. "He had his chance," he said angrily, to no one in particular.

"Phobos, everyone is just edgy right now," Ethos tried. "I'm sure Porthos didn't mean-,"

"Oh, shut up, Ethos," Phobos snapped. "What the fuck would you know about relationships; you're probably still a goddamn _virgin_."

Abel sucked in a breath in shock, and Puck looked like his was going at pop a vessel in his head, he was so angry. But Bazin beat them both to it.

"Sure he is, Phobos," Bazin retorted, shifting the box he held, probably to keep himself from throwing it in Phobos' face. "Or did you forget why he came here in the first place?"

Phobos looked like he'd been slapped. Both Ethos and Bazin had requested transfers after being assaulted by their first fighters, but Bazin had 'just' been slapped around. Ethos had been sexually assaulted, too.

Miserable and shaking, Phobos apologized. "I-I'm sorry," he said thickly. "I guess the real asshole's me."

Ethos had the class to forgive him with a shrug. "You're not," he told Phobos quietly. "Praxis is the nicest guy I've ever known, and he's in love with you, so you can't be all bad."

They got off on level 5, carrying their boxes into the crew storage bay. Ethos and Bazin were walking side by side, slightly ahead of the others. Abel heard Bazin quietly complain, "I thought_ I_ was the nicest guy you ever met, Ethos…?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wreck everything," Phobos sniffed again.

"Well, sweetie; we weren't exactly having a party in the first place," Puck shrugged. They gave the boxes to the clerk on duty and slowly filed out, Bazin and Ethos heading for the Lab in the opposite direction.

"Porthos seems like he's having a hard time with," Abel hesitated, not really knowing what Phobos and Porthos had been, other than friends with benefits. "With you being with Praxis now."

"Well, I'm having a hard time with it, too," Phobos said quietly.

They passed a group of fighters heading to training and Abel was surprised to find he didn't skirt out of the way like usual. A lot of things were changing, with the end of the war.

Phobos turned to Abel. "Aren't you going to have to choose sometime too, Abel?" he asked. "I mean, you have Deimos and Cain now?"

"My parents are a set of three," Puck shrugged. "I have two dads, and a mom. It works out fine."

"I never really thought about it," Abel said honestly. "It's all kind of new still, and I don't know how either of them feels. I don't even know what my plans are for after the war."

They made their way into central command, pausing in Puck's office so he could send a message to housekeeping to fumigate—er, clean—Kratos and Zelos' room.

"_I_ know," Phobos said, dropping into one of the chairs across from Puck's desk and swiveling back and forth lightly. "Shop, and work on my tan, in no particular order." He grinned. "I have a trust fund, and Praxie's gonna be a doctor."

Abel perched on the edge of Puck's desk, shaking his head and grinning. "Not me. I'd still like to pilot, or maybe get into ThermoFusion design."

Phobos made a show of yawning behind his hand, and Abel poked him lightly in the shin with his toe, laughing.

"I want to pilot too," Puck said absently. "Obie wants to complete his training to be a Master Chef; maybe open a restaurant or something."

He looked up at both of them and Abel could see the lines of strain in his youthful face, his fingers absently fiddling with his engagement ring. "If someone isn't cleaning out _our_ room next week, that is."


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

* * *

Tibalt first appears in _Task Name Encke_

Juno appears in _The Next Twenty-Four_

Dante and Nero appear in _My Alpha_ and _R and R_

Vergil and Sporus appear in _Walk with Me_ and _R and R_

* * *

About _Ave Maria:_ I am currently obsessed with Jonathon and Charlotte. Go to Youtube and watch their audition on Britain's Got Talent. If it doesn't make you cry, you have no soul. I love music but can't carry a tune in a bucket. Singing to me is a God given talent so I gave it to one of the characters here

* * *

It took less than 24 hours for a response to come from the families of Zelos and Kratos.

" 'The Family of Jean-Michel Tousignant thanks you for the notification of our Brother's death. His body may be cremated in space.' "

Keeler looked at Encke bleakly, resting his elbow on Encke's office desk, chin in his hand. He looked exhausted; the stress of the past few days had kept him tossing and turning at night, plagued with stomach pains. Everyone aboard the _Sleipnir_ was so ready to be done with this war, but Keeler, being who he was, had to take on his responsibilities and half a dozen more, too.

Encke was looking forward to nothing but a long, quiet life together in some tidy, simple little house back on earth. Keeler could teach and Encke could become a cop like he'd always wanted to. They could have a child, maybe a sweet little girl they could take to the park and push on the swings.

"…Would hope, that if I died out here, my family would at _least_ want to claim my body," Keeler was saying forlornly. "Have you had any luck with Kratos' next of kin? Or are they all in prison, too?"

Encke gave a grim smile. "Heard from his brother today, somebody named 'Jun Kurosawa' will be comin' in by shuttle at 16:00 hours."

Keeler shuddered. " 'Black swamp'," he said under his breath. "Fitting name for poor Kratos, wasn't it?"

"Hmm. S'pose so. Anyway, I'm kinda curious to see what his brother looks like. If he's anything like Kratos, I'll have to watch him like a hawk while he's here."

Keeler grinned darkly, standing when Encke did. "I'll go with you. I'm kinda curious, too."

* * *

A slightly built Japanese man in his early twenties stepped off the shuttle, his dark, almond eyes lighting on Encke's face and his mouth turning up in a smile.

"Hello, Encke," he said softly, bowing politely.

Encke's jaw dropped. "Tibalt…?" he asked in disbelief. "Are you-?"

"Takeshi's younger brother, yes," his former navigator nodded. He grinned, letting Encke pull him into a bear hug.

"Damn, baby," Encke said, still shaking his head in surprise. "I had no idea it'd be you comin'." He released him, aware of Keeler watching the two of them with a bemused look on his face.

"Uh, Tibalt—um, Jun; this is Commander Keeler; Lead Navigator of the _Sleipnir_, and my significant other. Keeler, this is Tibalt; uh, I mean, Jun. Tibalt was one of my best Navies, way back when."

Tibalt laughed, bowing and then shaking Keeler's hand warmly. "Honored to meet you, Commander Keeler." His eyes danced between the two men, and Encke was struck by how different he looked, from the frightened young Navigator that had flown with him so many years ago.

He certainly looked nothing like Kratos. Their faces were similar, to be sure; same full mouth and almond eyes. But Kratos had always looked like a stray dog, ready to be cursed at and kicked, willing to root through whatever trash life threw at him in order to survive. Tibalt had been traumatized nearly from day one in the Alliance, but had managed to grow into a man who held himself now with gentle confidence.

He could have just as easily become what Kratos had. The thought made Encke sick.

"It looks like you are finally happy," Tibalt said enigmatically, and Encke felt his face heat. "I can see why."

Now it was Keeler's turn to blush.

* * *

The group sobered as they entered the morgue. Light from the stasis fields glowed like pale, watery starshine, a gentle mechanized hum reverberating through the grey-walled room.

Kratos lay in the first bay. Tibalt stood quietly at his brother's side, one hand passing through the greenish halo surrounding Kratos' plainly garbed body to briefly touch his face. By some miracle, Dr. Patel had managed to make Kratos' face bearable to view.

"He looks so old," Tibalt said softly, eyes traveling sadly over his brother's body. "He would have been twenty-eight years old this month. I had honestly thought, he might have died many years ago."

He turned to Encke and Keeler, who waited patiently for him to explain. "I have not seen my brother for ten years. My mother never gave up hope that he would return, but it was not to be. Both our parents died before that could happen, but as Christ teaches us, all are reunited in the everlasting life."

"Please, can you tell me," Tibalt said. "How did my brother die?"

"He took his own life, after his Navigator unexpectedly died," Keeler said gently. "They were lovers."

Tibalt took a deep breath, relieved. "Thank you for telling me. I did not think it possible for my brother to love anyone, or for anyone to love him. May I have a few moments to pray, with Takeshi?"

Encke and Keeler waited quietly, sad as they watched Tibalt lay a hand on Kratos and Zelos as he stood between them both, softly finishing his prayer.

"Thank you," Tibalt said quietly afterward."What of the other man; has he family that will come to take his body also back to Earth?"

Encke shook his head. "No, Baby. We'll give him a military funeral here aboard ship."

Tibalt's gaze was inward. "Then…Kratos should remain by his side. I would not take from my brother, the one person important to him."

Keeler hesitated. "But, what about your sister?" he asked carefully. "Won't she want to see him, too?"

Tibalt's smile faded. "She does not remember him. It took many years for the nightmares she had, of the Dark Man, to fade. As far as she knows, he died many, many years ago."

His face grew hard. "And as far as I am concerned, that is where he will stay."

* * *

Colony 6 had changed everything for Porthos. When he and a handful of his other ship mates—Dante, Oberon, and Sporus among them—had shipped out to serve with the ground forces, the war was brought up close and personal; fast.

Dante had been killed within the first few weeks. It had been the last, sad chapter in the life of a man who had lived his whole life as one, long, adrenaline rush. His navigator, Vergil, had remained assigned to the_ Sleipnir_. When he learned of Dante's death, Vergil chose not to reenlist when his tour ended, quietly disappearing back to earth. No one ever heard from him again.

Oberon had survived, but with a harder edge to his mellow demeanor; hand to hand combat was a lot different than blasting enemy ships in space.

Sporus should never have gone; fey and fragile, he was assigned purely from drawing the short straw, Porthos had reasoned. There was a rumor too he'd been bedded by Cook, and Copernicus had caught them red handed, and everyone knew what happened when Copernicus didn't like you. Sporus' fighter, Nero, had been reassigned when some of the other fighters had shipped out, and, like Juno, he hadn't come back, either.

After listening to Sporus cry himself to sleep night after night, Porthos could see that Oberon was torn between bringing the frightened navigator into his own bed for comfort, or remaining true to his beloved Puck. Porthos had given them both a break and made the offer himself. Sporus readily accepted the comfort; needy and pliant, he was little different than Phobos had been once been.

Sporus didn't make it back either. Just three days shy of their return to the _Sleipnir_, he'd written a letter to his parents, washed down a handful of pills with a bottle of something equally illegal, and gone to sleep forever. Porthos found him the next morning, cold and blue in his own bunk, wrapped in a too large black field jacket that had once belonged to Nero. _Please ask Commander Keeler to_ _forgive me_, the note clutched in his hand read. He'd left nothing for Porthos, except the courtesy to not take his life while lying in the other man's bed.

Porthos had returned on the transport to the _Sleipnir_ and watched Puck and Oberon's tearful, joyous reunion, looking silently around the hangar deck for a familiar head of sleek blond hair. A handful of his fellow navigator's greeted him happily; Baz and Ethos and even Abel, but Phobos had been conspicuously absent.

It wasn't really a surprise, Phobos and he had been casual sex partners on and off since the Academy, but that was it. While Phobos had always hoped for more, Porthos wasn't ready to be exclusive. And so Phobos got his more from Praxis; and Porthos returned to his quarters alone. His fighter, Balizarde, was gone too, having taken a medical discharge while Porthos was dodging insurgents on Colony 6.

It seemed as though Porthos was destined to spend the remaining weeks of his enlistment miserably alone. At this point, he couldn't find it in himself to care. As soon as his tour ended he wanted as far away from the_ Sleipnir_ and everyone aboard, and had no intentions of looking back.

The spat he and Phobos had had, in front of their friends, no less, had cemented his decision. Everyone was spoken for anyway; either paired up with someone on board, or with someone they'd left behind back home. Bazin had a beautiful girlfriend he'd dutifully marry and have 2.5 kids with, though he was hopelessly in love with his fighter, Aramis.

There had been someone waiting for Porthos, too; a girl named Esme who was the daughter of one of his father's richest colleagues. Porthos—he'd been Claude then, of course—had grown up with Esme since they were three; rode hover bikes and played zero-G jai alai and ran track together in highschool. He loved Esme, but unfortunately only as a sister. She'd had a good belly laugh when he confessed that to her, before he'd left for the Academy. She already knew she preferred women, and had a girlfriend already. Porthos had been immensely relieved.

Porthos had always been a loner, but now; Phobos having slipped through his fingers by his own stupidity, and in the wake of Sporus' death, he was lonely, too. He thought about Ethos from time to time, which he found rather odd. Porthos' 'type' had always been willowy and fey, and Ethos was far more masculine, despite his air of sweetness. He was beautiful, though; compassionate and kind, intelligent without being cold and aloof, like Porthos was.

* * *

On the nights he couldn't sleep, afraid he'd wake and find a slim body, cold in his arms, he'd sit in the Obs deck and smoke and stare at the stars. The long arm of the Milky Way spread before him as though some thief had strewn his pocketful of stolen jewels into the sky, to hide them in the black of space forever. Porthos narrowed his steel grey eyes, finding the navigational anchors that had guided him to safety for the past three years; the Northern Cross in Cygnus, the twin moons of Mars, Deimos and Phobos, and the star-like glow of Earth and Earth's own moon. He was calculating a complex set of equations to create an alternate flight path to avoid Solar Flare gravitational effects, when he heard it.

A soft tenor sang from the far side of the deck. The words were a plea to the Virgin Mother of the Christ for intercession. Porthos knew little if anything about Christ, or any other of the old Earth mythological Gods—Buddah, Allah, Vishnu—having been raised in a family ruled by logic and cold, hard science. But Oberon knew all about _Jésus_; even worshipped him, which, along with being head over heels in love with Puck, simply furthered Porthos' opinion that the French-Haitian Fighter was a kook. A nice guy, but nuts.

Oberon could sing too, and pray with beads, and Porthos had heard the deep voice murmuring the words to Sporus in the night, like a father trying to calm a frightened child.

"_Ave Maria, Gratia plena;_

_Maria, Gratia plena;_

_Maria, Gratia plena._

_Ave, ave Dominus_

_Dominus tecum…."_

It wasn't Oberon's voice now, however, and the dark silhouette standing before the star filled viewing port had a jumble of curly hair, instead of long, dark dreds. Porthos struck his lighter, the flame briefly illuminating his face as he drew a calming drag on his cigarette. The singing abruptly stopped, replaced by a little 'oh!' of surprise.

"I-I didn't know anyone else was here," Ethos said in the darkness, sounding embarrassed.

Porthos, shrugged, taking another drag and exhaling slowly. "Neither did I." He was silent a moment, studying Ethos curiously. "Didn't know you could sing."

"I-I can't, not really," Ethos stammered, and Porthos could almost see him blush. "Not very good, anyway."

Porthos continued to smoke, silently watching Ethos squirm. You could learn a lot about people by just keeping your mouth shut and letting them talk. It was obvious Ethos would like nothing more than to run out of the room, but he stayed where he was, fidgeting under Porthos' quiet scrutiny. Intrigued, Porthos broke the silence first.

"Want a smoke?" he offered, holding the pack toward the younger Navigator.

Ethos just stared at him, crossing the room to sit beside him hesitantly. As Porthos raised a pale shaggy eyebrow, Ethos continued to stare at the pack of cigarettes. "Um, no thanks, Porthos. I don't smoke."

Porthos gave another non-committal shrug, tucking the pack in his off duty jacket. "Yeah, didn't really think so." He chuckled a bit at Ethos' offended look. "Wouldn't be able to sing so pretty if you did."

"Oh; I-I thought it was because you thought I was too young, or something."

Porthos took another slow drag, watching as Ethos' eyes stared at his mouth the whole time. Ethos _was_ too young, too pretty and soft and innocent to be in the Alliance.

"So, what are you doing here after lights out," Porthos asked quietly. He flicked the butt to the cold metal floor, grinding it out without breaking eye contact with his visitor. "Besides singing?"

Now it was Ethos turn to shrug. "Same thing you are," he said, almost on a whisper. He looked away, brows drawn into a troubled frown. "Not sleeping."

_And probably staying out of his own room, so Praxis and Phobos could screw_, Porthos thought with a flash of disgust. He laid his arm along the seat behind Ethos' head, and asked, "Do you know what it means? _The Ave Maria_?"

"It's a lullaby," Ethos answered, nodding. "My grandmother used to sing it to me at night, if I couldn't sleep." He waited a moment and added, "After my mother died."

No one had ever sang to Porthos in the night. "It's a prayer," Porthos corrected without judgment. "But I guess it could sound like a lullaby, too."

Ethos tilted his head in thought. "I didn't know," he admitted. "I can't read Latin either. I just liked the way the melody sounded." He gave a self-deprecating smile. "Pretty stupid, huh?"

Porthos brought his hand up to stroke the back of Ethos' curly hair. It was soft, the curls springy against his palm. "Can I hear the rest of it?" Porthos asked, letting his hand rest on Ethos' shoulder.

He hesitated so long, Porthos was certain he was going to refuse. And then Ethos closed his eyes, and moistened his lips again briefly.

"_Benedicta, tu in mulieribus,_

_Et benedictus,_

_Et benedictus fructus ventris._

_Ventris tui Jesus….."_

The last notes faded into the darkness, pulling Porthos back from a stunned reverie. "Well, that's probably not very good, without being in the shower," Ethos joked lamely, embarrassed again.

"It was beautiful," Porthos said, and he meant it. He waited for Ethos to protest, to put himself down. But the younger Navigator surprised him again.

"Thank you," Ethos said simply, an almost-smile curving his mouth, though his eyes remained full of sorrow. Porthos saw those same eyes, every day when he looked in the mirror.

It was time to stop looking.

"You need a place to crash?" Porthos offered. His hand gently squeezed the back of Ethos' neck. He waited, while Ethos subjected him to a long, quiet scrutiny in return.

"Yes," he answered finally. "Yeah Porthos, I do."


	6. Chapter 6

Chap 6

Here's your first sex scene, and it's with Ethos; haters gonna hate :)

I have always wanted to have a Native American character in Starfighter too

I see Porthos as a jock, and Jai Alai seemed a rather fitting sport for him

* * *

When Praxis had been reassigned to the _Excelsior_, Ethos had been given a new Fighter, task named Tyr. Fearing the worst, Ethos had been surprised to find a shy, brown-skinned boy about his age in his quarters one night, with sleek black hair and a long, straight nose. Tyr spoke little Earth Standard English, his native tongue a mixture of colonial Spanish with smatterings of Navajo. It was easier for two lonely young men to communicate with their bodies than with words anyway, and almost from their first night together, Ethos and Tyr did.

Ethos sang for Tyr when he was crying at night, intimidated by the older, stronger fighters; missing his brother who was stationed on Starbase 11 terribly. Ethos spoke to Abel after a few weeks, who spoke to Encke, and Tyr was transferred back to his brother again. Abel must have persuaded Encke to leave Ethos unpartnered until Praxis could return, for which Ethos would always be grateful.

There hadn't been anyone since Tyr, though, and Ethos loathed becoming involved with another Fighter anyway. He might have pursued a relationship with Bazin, except that they were more like brothers; and Abel was involved with Cain, and Deimos, and for a short time, Encke. Probably Keeler, too. Some people had all the luck.

Porthos had always seemed aloof to him, but he liked the fact that he was quiet, and intelligent. Porthos was as beautiful as the Norse God poor Tyr had been misnamed for, and Ethos knew no one that looked like him would be interested in someone that looked like Ethos. Especially with Phobos hovering in the background, possessive and jealous even when he was with Praxis now, instead Porthos.

If watching Zelos die had taught Ethos anything, it was that war wasn't the only thing that killed young men. The grief that Kratos had wailed unchecked had taught an even crueler lesson: everyone, no matter how damaged, craved, and deserved, companionship and love. Kratos was a brute, but Zelos had called for him with his last breath. Ethos would never understand it, but he would never forget it, either.

* * *

Porthos' cabin was dark, and empty; tidy without being fussy. The bed was slightly rumpled, beckoning; and Ethos flushed and turned his head quickly before Porthos could catch him staring. There was a chess board set up on the small dresser, a Zero-G Jai Alai helmet and Cesta dangling from the unused top bunk.

"Oh," Ethos said, turning the white Queen over in his hand. "Do you play-?"

He was alone in the room, eyes searching in confusion through the still muted light, when he heard water running in the head. Porthos emerged a moment later, wiping his hands on his thighs.

"Sorry; had to rinse my mouth," he said, crossing the room. "Didn't want to taste like cigarettes, when I kiss you."

And then he closed the distance between them, tilting Ethos' face up with his large hands, and he didn't taste like anything but heat. Ethos reached blindly behind himself, the chess piece fumbled back on the board so he could wind his arms around Porthos' broad shoulders, drawing their bodies flush together. With surprise, he felt Porthos drop one arm to curl around his waist, growling in the back of his throat and Ethos realized, _he's just as hungry for this as I am._

* * *

It made it easier, to let his clothes fall away layer by layer, as Porthos did the same, both of them tangled together soon after, the bed no longer empty. Porthos might be quiet but he was a very tactile person, his hands caressing the curves of Ethos' chest and thighs, his mouth following soon after. When he laid Ethos on his back, flushed and panting Ethos drew his legs up instinctively.

But Porthos shook his head. "You first, okay?" he murmured, reaching a hand up beneath the mattress of the upper bunk.

"Okay," Ethos whispered back, not quite believing this was real. Porthos slicked him and rolled a condom in place, reached a long arm back and slicked himself, rose up over Ethos and took him inside.

"Oh-!" Ethos panted, scarcely able to keep his eyes open because the sight of this exquisitely beautiful man, riding his lap, was going to make him lose himself too soon.

"Good?" Porthos panted, rising up and down, bent forward so his head cleared the vacant bed above. His palms were splayed on Ethos bare chest, forearms taut and straining as his powerful thighs lifted him up and down, up and down.

"Yessss," Ethos moaned, writhing with every movement, hands on Porthos' hips to help him slide up and down. "So good..!"

"Yeah," Porthos grinned, laughing with a shaky little groan. "Feels good, baby." He shifted one hand to his erection and began to pump, head tipping back and the long, taut line of his neck made Ethos cry out, unable to hold back his climax any longer.

"Almost," Porthos gasped, freezing in place as Ethos held him flush against his lap, shuddering through the aftershocks. His eyes were squeezed tight, mouth open, panting and Ethos stared breathless and dizzy with wonder. "Almost there, al-almost—"

"Porthos; Porthos," Ethos chanted, hands massaging his thighs, the muscles rigid as the tension in his sculpted body built, and built-

With a gasping cry, Porthos spilled over his hand, a warm, viscous fountain spurting high and landing on Ethos' belly, coating Porthos' fist.

"Fuck….fuck you're sexy, baby," Porthos smiled sweaty and sated. "Stay? Please?"

As if I can even move right now… "Okay," Ethos panted, smiling ear to ear. Porthos leaned down and as they kissed, Ethos silently thanked Phobos for kicking both of them out of their beds.

* * *

They'd made orbit around Mars forty-eight hours ago, and had started patrolling for the Rogue Vessel, as Command had dubbed it, almost immediately. Since coming back from the _Excelsior_, Keeler's focus had been on preparations to end the war. Not just for himself, but for thirty-five Navigators who'd probably appreciate getting their VA pensions someday. There were forms to review and sign, commendations to bestow, letters of reference to tuck inside personnel files. In reality it sometimes took more effort to end a war, than to start one.

Thirty-five….The _Sleipnir_ had started with fifty Fighter-Navigator teams some eighteen months ago. They'd completed their mission-find and destroy a Colteron shipyard—just prior to Keeler's promotion, and transfer, to the _Excelsior_. Destroying the shipyard was sort of like being back on his uncle's farm, and poking a stick at a hornet's nest. You could burn the nest, but then the hornets had nowhere to go. And, they were mad as hell.

Sometimes a freeze came, and the all the hornets died. The Peace Treaty had frozen things too, called a halt to hostilities that had been going on for nearly seven years. Problem was, one of the hornets was still out there, pissed off and ready to attack. The nest was gone, so it figured it had nothing to lose.

On top of all this; the paper work and saying goodbyes and climbing back into the goddamn_ Scythe_, an old friend had come to visit.

* * *

The fancy word was _Gastroparesis_. When Keeler had flown into a rock in space and killed his Fighter-lover, Apollo, and nearly himself, he'd been left with a few souvenirs. One was the whisper thin scar that snaked up the back of his neck into his hair. Another was a screwed up digestive system that came back to haunt him in times of stress. He'd spent half the three months on the _Excelsior_ with his head in the toilet, though no one ever knew. Keeler was very good at hiding things when he wanted to.

* * *

"Baby, you constipated or somethin'?"

Keeler gasped, bent over the toilet seat and trying to breathe in between retching. Shaking, he fumbled a hand toward the sink and turned the water on louder.

"Just—I'll be out in a minute," he called, retching miserably afterward with tears streaming down his face.

Encke, oblivious, was chuckling from the other side of the door. "Okay, but don't forget we got that meetin' in about 15 minutes, and you know old Cock'll have our asses—"

Keeler gave another heave, whimpering and shaky and just begging for the wave to pass.

"….And don't forget to turn the vents up when you're done in there, I remember"….And don't forget to turn the vents up when you're done in there, I remember whatcha ate for dinner last night, hee hee…!"

He knew the worst was probably over, when worries about the mornings debriefing began to crowd back into his head. Slowly he stood, washed his ashen face and rinsed his mouth, and brushed his disheveled hair.

Keeler turned the vents up and went to finish dressing for the day.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

* * *

Two sex scenes for the price of one ahead!

_Lubovnik_ is Deimos' pet name for Cain, it means 'lover', and I can't ever remember to spell it the same way twice.

Oberon has too many French pet names for Puck to mention. You can probably figure them out without Google translator

* * *

Deimos moaned into Cain's hot mouth, loving the way Cain's sleep warmed body melted into his own. Abel had jokingly dubbed Cain Mr. Morning, because that's when Cain was always insatiably horny, languid and hard and ready to fuck, morning breath be damned. Deimos was always ready, no matter if it was night or day, craving the feel of Cain's beautiful male body atop his own. He threaded his fingers through the unruly black spikes of Cain's hair, loving the moan he elicited when he tugged hard, the way he knew Cain liked.

It was sweet too, the tender nonsense Cain would murmur at his ear when he was so far gone into lust he had no idea what he was saying.

"Mmmnnnuh, Myshonok," Cain moaned against his throat, rocking his body against Deimos and rubbing himself hard and leaking in the warm spot where Deimos' thigh joined his hip. "Wanna stuff your hot little ass fulla' my dick, ohhhhh…."

Deimos laughed breathlessly against his ear, tilting his pelvis up and thrusting back. "Do it then, _lubovnik_."

"Too sleepy, nnnuh…." Cain trailed off; his groin starting a circular rub that Deimos knew teased the sensitive underside of his erection until Deimos' flat belly was wet.

The door to the head hissed open and a waft of shower-warmed air filled the outer room. Abel laughed, shaking his head as he stepped over their writhing bodies to get to his uniform in the dresser.

"You two still at it?" he grinned, and Deimos would have laughed back if he wasn't panting so hard.

"Come play?" he reached a hand and rubbed Abel's calf, making him squeak and flinch away from the tickling sensation.

"We have a briefing in," Abel squinted at the clock, pulling his shorts and socks on, hopping on one foot and almost falling on Cain's ass, "Less than 15 minutes; snap it up, you two."

He gave Cain's flexing bare ass cheeks a playful smack, making Cain yelp and burrow deeper into Deimos' arms.

"Did you like that, sexy?" Abel purred, kneeling next to the writhing pair with a gleam in his eye. His hands began to play with Cain's ass, massaging and pinching and Deimos felt Cain's shudder all the way to his bones. Cain spread his legs, Abel's face rapt as he shared a secret grin with Deimos.

Deimos tilted his face up and Abel bent to kiss him, tasting minty and warm as their tongues curled sensuously together.

He heard Abel shift, and then Cain tore his mouth away from Deimo's neck, crying out in pleasure. A spike of arousal coursed through Deimos like fire as Abel continued thrusting his tongue deep in his mouth, all the while doing something that was making Cain cry out over and over again.

Unable to stand it anymore, Deimos broke for air, gasping, "what are you do-doing to him?!"

Abel smiled, flushed and breathless and pulled away from Cain long enough to snag the tube of oil they kept tucked under one of the mattress pads. Holding Deimos' wide eyed gaze, he coated his index and middle fingers of his left hand and with a 'sh' to his lips with his right, leaned over and reached between Cain's legs.

Cain gave a shout of ecstasy, body taut and shaking as Abel's shoulder worked rhythmically and the look on Abel's face, and Cain's, toppled Deimos over the edge. He gasped, arched his back and then he was gushing deliciously between their bodies.

"Ahhh! Princess; don't' stop!" Cain begged, his frotting becoming more erratic as Abel continued to finger fuck him, hard. Flushed and hard himself now, Abel pulled his dick free of his shorts, spit on his palm and started jerking off furiously. If Deimos hadn't already come, he'd have blown his load just watching him. The rosy flush spread from Abel's throat to his face and chest and with a shout he shot four, long stripes of come across Cain's ass.

"OhhhhOHH!" Cain wailed and Deimos felt him pulse against his belly. After shaking and swearing, Cain collapsed boneless and heavy on top of him, murmuring in Russian in Deimos' ear. Ten seconds later he started snoring, and Deimos looked up at Abel in alarm.

Abel giggled like an idiot. "Hang on; I'll go get a washcloth," he said, and bounced back into the head once more.

Deimos was sticky and being smothered and he was ready to fall asleep again himself.

Mmmmm, he thought_. This ought to be a really great day…._

* * *

Oberon lay sprawled on his back in their bed, too lanky to be truly comfortable but at the moment he couldn't complain. Puck had made them wake up early, again, _le petit monstre_, and had been chattering away like a squirrel for the past ten minutes, all worked up in a tizzy about the morning's briefing.

"Oh!" he exclaimed, hand clamped to his mouth in dismay, "Oh, I hope I remembered to pull up those schematics Commander Cook wanted ; I _know_ I got the ones of the quadrant the 'Teron ships were spotted coming from just before they strafed Colony 6, but I can't _remember_ if I got….."

Oberon wasn't listening, lying there and watching his lover dart about their cabin getting dressed for the day. Puck had so far managed to put on one sock and his underpants, continually distracted by whatever random worries kept popping into his head.

More than a little distracted himself, Oberon's dark eyes kept following Puck's every movement like a great lazy cat ready to pounce on an unknowing_ petit_ _lapin_. Puck had never worn this particular pair of underpants, snug little briefs that were white as snow, hugging the curves of his sweet little _derrière_ just right. He'd bought them on shore leave once and stuffed them away and it was only now, when he'd forgotten to pick up his clothes from the ship's laundry, he'd grudgingly slipped them on.

Oberon never wore anything to bed and right now, watching Puck bend over to type something into his tablet, complaining all the while, he was hard enough to burst through the sheets.

He closed his eyes with a shudder and then yelped as he was rudely smacked in the head with a sock.

"Hey!" Puck glared down at him, face scrunched up in a disapproving little frown. "Get up, you big lazy! You haven't heard I word I just said, have you?!"

Oberon blinked at him, standing there indignant with his pretty little nipples peaked and his hand saucily on his hip. Puck shook the sock at him again, scolding and with a growl Oberon surged out of the blankets, his arms shooting out until he had a squirming bundle of Puck face down across his lap.

"What are you-OWWW! OBIE!" Puck yelled, indignant. Unable to stop himself, Oberon had yanked down those tight little pants and bit Puck right on his left cheek.

"You _vilain garçon!_ " Oberon admonished him loudly over the _smack_! of his palm on Puck's ass, staining it bright pink. "Do not think I am_ estipid_, you wicked little _tease_-!"

"OwOW! Oh; Harder!"

"—Running about in these sexy little pants, making me crazy!" Both cheeks were covered with livid palm prints and Puck was laughing in between his pleas for mercy.

"Well—OW!—If you weren't—so—Ow; OW-WOW! –s-slow-hee hee hee-!"

Oberon saw red, flipping his much smaller lover with a _whoof_! of delighted surprise onto his back.

"We will see," he panted, yanking the pants down and sending them sailing somewhere over his shoulder, "Who is _slow_, you little imp!"

He snatched the lube from underneath the pillow, hauling Puck's legs over his broad shoulders and spreading them wide. Leaning forward, his long dark braids fell about his face, curtaining them both in secrecy.

"How do you like it?" he asked with a feral grin, his lubed fingers rubbing up and down the crack of Puck's ass, stroking but not penetrating. "You like being teased, _non_?'

"_Non_! I mean, Yes! I-Oh, Obie, please!"

He was beautiful like this, completely uninhibited and trusting himself to Oberon's mercy. Puck's hands gripped Oberon's tense, muscled forearms, squeezing almost painfully. He flung his head back on a wail of ecstasy as two fingers finally penetrated him and Oberon silenced him with a deep, probing kiss. He could feel his lover's perineum tense and he pulled his fingers free, breaking the kiss to slick his heavy erection and position himself between Puck's thighs.

"You are not allowed to—;" with a grunt he felt Puck's resistance give way but he stilled himself so as not to hurt him. "—Come; until I say so! Um, _mon dieu_! Wait for me—"

"NNhhUH! Then you be-better hurry the hell—harder, OH!—_up_-!"

Oberon laughed, shaky and gasping as he began to thrust in and out of that snug, velvet heat. "Impatient—demanding-!"

"Harder, harder; Oh! Don't stop!" Puck wailed. "Please, please, let me come!"

"Almost—wait—" Oberon panted, and then Puck let go of his shoulders to rub his fingers over his nipples, light and tantalizing and Oberon gave a shout, exploding with intense relief, barely registering Puck screaming in orgasm beneath him.

"Oh, _Je t'aime beaucoup_!" Oberon panted, kissing every inch of Puck's beautiful, sweaty little face. "You make such sweet love with me,_ cheri_."

"Oh Obie, I lo-,"

They both froze as the chime to their room faded, and faint giggling came from the other side of the door. "Um, we were going to see if you guys wanted to walk down to the mess with us," Abel's voice called sheepishly, and Cain laughed in the background , "Doesn't sound like Puck'll be walking anywhere for a while, hah!".

"But, um if you're busy-,"

Oberon groaned and buried his face in his hand, hearing Deimos snickering too. "—If you're busy, um, we'll just _seeyouatth briefingokaybye_!"

Puck's bony little fingers stoked his face gently. Oberon looked down to see him biting his lip, scarlet from forehead to chest.

"Well," he said brightly, "at least we know we're not late yet!"

* * *

Praxis and Phobos almost were, though, skating in just a minute before Cook was to start. Ethos looked at them and rolled his eyes as Praxis dropped into the seat next to him, surreptitiously pulling his collar up to cover the hickey on his neck. Keeler might have found it amusing, if he wasn't fighting to keep from barfing all over the table.

Cook led the briefing, thankfully, though it should have been Keeler's job. The man took one look at Keeler and seemed to agree it was best Keeler kept his mouth shut for the time being. It was humiliating, but not as bad as the hard stare Puck gave him, and the worried glances he kept getting from Encke.

He knew what Puck was thinking, but he hadn't touched a stimulant in over year, and he wasn't about to start now.

"An hour ago, the Bridge picked up a faint fuel signature from the ship responsible for the attack on Colony 6. The Colteron Empire has turned over the ID on the ship in question, and has offered full cooperation and assistance in bringing those responsible to justice."

"No," Encke said bluntly, before he could stop himself, Keeler knew. Cook merely raised an eyebrow and continued.

"The President of Earth and the Chancellor of Mars agree with you, Commander Encke," Cook said mildly. "This initiative will be Alliance led."

_You mean _Sleipnir_-led_, Keeler thought darkly. "Sir," he said, clearing his throat and forcing himself to speak, "Has Mother offered counsel?"

Cook traded a glance with Bering, who answered instead. "Yes, Commander Keeler. They perceive no deception on the part of the Colterons, and sense that this attack is the action of Insurgents."

He paused. "They also advise they will attack again, and soon."

* * *

The rest of the meeting was more B.S. waltzing around two simple facts; the fuckers were coming back to finish what they started, and Encke's job was to get his team out there and stop them. They were a sound, healthy group too, as fed up with the war as he was, but determined to see this final task to the end. All except for Keeler, who'd gone from looking awful when they'd left their quarters, to alarming, over the course of the briefing. Encke glared at Cook, willing the bastard to shut up so he could get Keeler out of the stuffy little room before he passed out.

"Dismissed," Cook said finally and everyone pushed back their chairs, going off in groups of twos and threes to discuss things in more minute detail.

Encke only had one thing on his mind. "You gonna make it?" He said lowly to Keeler as he rose, pasty faced and miserable looking. Encke steered him out of the room without appearing to, Puck coming up anxiously along Keeler's other side.

"Sweetie, let me take you to lay down for a minute, okay?" Puck offered quietly, and Keeler nodded, Encke watching, worried, as they veered unsteadily down the lonely corridor to Central command.

He hated to leave Keeler like this, but he had a pressing matter to attend to first.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

* * *

Callisto is sort of the human version of a cheetah

I wish I had thought of Encke's nickname for Cook 22 stories ago

Chlorine trifluoride is the stuff of nightmares

* * *

When I was about 11 or 12, the newspapers carried lists of Vietnam war casualties every day. There were lists for POW (prisoner of war) MIA (missing in action), or dead. Everyone had POW bracelets which had the name and rank of a soldier. I still have my bracelets, one for Lt. Col. Jack Bomar and another for Capt. Harry Jenkins, Jr. The idea was to send the soldier or his family the bracelet when you learned their fate. I never knew what happened to either man.

* * *

He found Cassius in the corner of the training rooms, taking his frustrations out on his favorite punching bag. Encke indulged himself in a brief moment of staring; Cass was tall with an athletic build, his lean muscles running with sweat. Not bulky muscle, like Encke, and at thirty-four, eight years his senior. Encke didn't think for a minute he could beat Cassius in a boxing match, however.

Everyone thought that Cass' facial scars were from some heroic battle, but Encke knew better. Cassius was the sixth child of an alcoholic, drug addicted mother, who left him for days in the care of his elderly grandmother. Grandma punished children who talked too much with her curling iron. Cass had been seven. When he was stripped down like this, bare chested and clad only in training slacks, the other punishments were visible, too.

Stepping into his Sergeant's line of vision, Cass looked up, landed a few more crushing blows and stopped, catching the 50 kilo bag as it swung back at him, stilling it easily with one hand. He grabbed his towel and mopped his face and torso as Encke strode nearer.

"We head out in an hour," Encke began without preamble. "Shouldn't take more'n thirty, fouty minutes, tops, to check out this 'signature', as Cock puts it."

Cass managed to smile at that, Encke's pet name for the Navigator's superior officer, a man who'd probably had his dick in half the Navies on board. And a few of the Fighters, too.

"When I come back, we'll head planet side, okay?" There had been several dozen crew dispersed to the surface already to help with emergency relief efforts, and to help patrol the ruined city. Cassius couldn't go until Encke returned, taking charge of the Lead Fighter's duties during his absence.

Encke couldn't help but feel guilty; he knew Cass' calm exterior was masking a gnawing terror over the fate of his missing family. But duty came first, for both of them.

"Thank you, sir," Cassius said with a nod of gratitude. He couldn't quite manage a smile.

"You heard anything from Jaleesa yet?"

Cass shook his head. "No, sir," he answered bleakly. "I've been checking the comm traffic as often as I can, but everything's a mess coming out of the colony."

He looked down, tossing the towel back and forth between his hands. "She's not on any of the lists yet, and neither are the girls, so that's something at least."

"You get that 'list' business outta your mind, son," Encke scowled. The data the comm traffic did update were the Casualty lists, for the dead, wounded and missing. So far, Cass' family—his thirty year old, pregnant wife, Jaleesa, and their three daughters- were still classified as 'missing'.

"We'll find 'em, baby," Encke insisted. "I gotta meet these four beautiful women you keep tellin' me about."

Cassius did smile at that. "I don't know how I got so lucky sometimes myself."

Encke grinned and with a nod headed toward the door.

"Be careful, sir." Cassius called before he could leave.

"Always, son. See ya in a couple of hours."

* * *

Puck wasn't at his desk, his tablet beeping and his chair shoved hastily aside. Encke took one look at Keeler's open office door and quickened his pace.

"Get out!" Puck snapped, head flying up as Encke entered Keeler's office to find him losing his meager breakfast in the trash. Puck was holding Keeler's beautiful hair out of his face as he heaved and Encke hurried to his side, a cold knot of fear clenching in his gut. First Zelos, not Keeler, too.

"Sorry," Puck said sheepishly but Encke waved him off, taking his place behind Keeler as he retched almost silently, tears streaming down his face. Trust Keeler to do even this with a minimum of fanfare and Encke rubbed his back gently until he sat back on his heels, sweaty and shaking. Puck was there, a wet cloth in his hand from God knew where, and a cup of water. Keeler wiped his face and rinsed his mouth, turning his face away from the trash with a grimace.

"Oh that's disgusting," he whispered shakily, and Encke pulled the can out of his line of scent and sight.

"That all of it, Baby?" He asked gently, looking over his head to mouth the words _'Call Medical'_ to an anxiously hovering Puck.

"Yeah, hope-hope so," Keeler said and didn't protest when Encke hauled him to his feet. Didn't say a word either when medical arrived to check him over, his eyes closed and pale lashes fanned against his even paler face. By the time he'd gotten a few injections to calm the nausea and replace the fluids he'd lost, he was looking more embarrassed than ill.

"Commander, inform_ Reliant_ she'll be sitting out the next patrol;" Cook, who'd come when medical had arrived, addressed Encke. "I want Abel to pilot the _Scythe_ with you-"

"If you're going to insist on pulling me off rotation," Keeler said, voice tight with humiliation and anger as he slumped at his desk, still too weak to stand, "Don't pull the _Reliant_ off too. Callisto's out of medical, he can fly the _Scythe_ with Commander Encke, sir."

Cook nodded. "Restricted to quarters for the next twenty-four hours, Keeler," he said, looking at Encke instead. "I expect you to sleep, not work."

Keeler waited until the door hissed shut behind his commanding officer to start swearing.

"Well, that's a new one, sweetie," Puck commented drily, bringing the trashcan back empty and clean from wherever he'd taken that, too. "Not sure if it's even anatomically possible or if Commander Cook is flexible enough to do it, anywho."

"Get the fuck out," Keeler snapped, and Puck shrugged, non-plussed.

"Whatever you say, _Sir_," he said, but before he could turn and walk away, Keeler looked up, face creased with guilt.

"Sweetheart-,"

"Save it," Puck said flatly, unsmiling. "You can buy me a beer when I come back."

Encke watched the door hiss shut behind him, the sound seeming to come out of Keeler too, leaving him like a deflated balloon. "Please let me know if there's any other way I can screw up today," Keeler said miserably, closing his eyes.

"You better not be pregnant," Encke said wryly, and Keeler gave a weak, unhappy laugh. He let Encke sling an arm around him and guide him from his office, which worried Encke even more than the impromptu vomiting.

"Why, did you forget to take your pill?" Keeler joked, but neither of them smiled.

* * *

Encke helped Keeler change and clean up ("Oh, nice; I pissed myself too? Goddammit, I knew there was a reason I hated throwing up!"). By the time he'd settled Keeler into their bed, Keeler was looking at him with tears bright in his eyes.

"We're supposed to be done with this by now," he said thickly, clinging to Encke's hands as he pulled him down to sit beside him. "This war is supposed to be over; we've done our share for King and Country, why can't we go home?"

He cried then, hand scrunched up over his eyes like a little boy instead of a grown man, a decorated fleet Commander. "Encke, I just want to go home. I want—I want to start over, I want us to start our lives, we were promised Peace a month ago, so where the hell is it?!"

"I wish I knew…I want to start our lives too, Baby," Encke said gently, kissing his hands and laying down so that Keeler could cradle him to his chest while he wept. The familiar thud of Keeler's heart was fast with emotion but strong and Encke closed his eyes, sighing as Keeler's hands stroked his neck, his head. "I want outta this so goddamn bad; want to get a real job, a real house and start fillin' it up with kids."

Keeler was quiet for a long time; so long Encke had almost fallen asleep against him. "We never talked about children," he said at last, and Encke rose up to meet his eyes.

"You want kids?"

"I don't know…Maybe? I can't see myself, a houseful of toys and toddler drool on my shirt."

Encke chuckled. "Who says you get to stay home; an' be mommy? Maybe I wanna do that. Stay home an' watch the soaps; eat bon-bons and-"

"Only if you greet me at the door with a martini in your hand when I get home from the office," Keeler chuckled softly; "wearing nothing but a little pink apron."

Encke thought about it for a minute or two. "Peach is more my color," he deadpanned, grinning when Keeler really laughed.

"Go kick some insurgent ass," he ordered, swatting him, and Encke leaned down to kiss him, laughing against his mouth. "The sooner you do, the quicker we can go to that place where you—"

"—Don't wear nothin' but a tan; yeah, I'm lookin' forward to that, Baby."

They kissed again, and then Encke rose with a small smile. Before he could leave, Keeler called him back.

"I love you," he said quietly, and Encke looked at his beautiful face, lined with exhaustion and making him look older than his years.

"Love you too, Baby," he said, and walked out, never knowing he wouldn't be walking back in again for a very long time.

* * *

Callisto was already in the locker room off the hangar bay, sealing the last closures on his cream and white flight suit. He looked up, his piercing violet blue eyes locking on Encke's face. Callisto was a few years older than Cass; old, for a Navigator still on combat duty. Like Encke's second in command, he was all bone and lean muscle without an ounce of fat from head to toe. His close cropped silvery white hair and the sharp angles of his face make him look older than his years. Encke had always thought him cold and rather unapproachable, no beauty in him except those eyes; all business instead.

As always, he got right to the point. "How is Commander Keeler?" he asked, his voice deceptively deep for a man so thin.

Encke shruggged, stripping out of his fatigues and pulling his own freshly decontaminated suit out of his locker. "Sleeping. 'Least, he better be."

Callisto nodded, satisfied. "I'll start our preflight check, sir," he said, and turned to stride quietly from the room.

* * *

By this point in his service, Encke had flown with nearly every Navigator on the ship; sat in the gunner's seat in just about every Starfighter. The _Scythe _would always be his first love, though; the ship he and Keeler called their own. It took a while to get used to another pair of hands piloting the orb (a flight with Phobos at the helm in particular was not one of Encke's happier memories), but in Callisto's practiced hands, Encke at least felt guaranteed a safe landing back aboard ship.

"She's ready for us," Callisto said, handing Encke the ship's diagnostic tablet. He waited patiently for Encke to scan the data before affixing his thumbprint signature alongside Callisto's in the top right hand corner.

"Good, I wanna get this patrol over and done as soon as possible."

He looked about the hangar bay, seeing the four other teams in various stages of pre-flight preparedness. It made him feel that much more secure, seeing his team synchronized and working efficiently without any squabbles.

"Looks like the kids are all playin' nicely today," he remarked, starting the climb up the access ladder on the side of the ship.

Callisto raised a thin eyebrow. "They are now, sir."

"Perfect. What did I miss; _Reliant_ and _Tiberius_ beatin' on their chests again?"

Callisto gave a rare smile as he swung himself up into the cockpit. "Briefly. _Ares _Navigator seems to be channeling Commander Keeler in his absence. His suggestion that they cease hostilities to avoid 'sitting in time out like a couple of five year olds' was quite effective."

Encke shook his head, chuckling as he settled into his seat and began strapping himself into his saftey harness. "Phobos'll make a good kindergarten teacher someday."

"Hm. Hardly, sir; he claims he hates children. Switching to inter ship communications now," he added, and Encke could hear the flick and tap of his hands across his instruments from behind him.

"All hands; confirm pre-launch status," Encke said over the comm link. He checked his own instruments while absently listening for the various affirmatives from the other four teams. Torpedoes full, laser canons at 97% efficiency, not bad, for a ship that had taken more than one pounding the last few years

He thought back to his conversation with Cass, wondering with a pang where his family was. "'Bout you, Callisto? You got any kids?"

There was silence from the other end of the cramped Starfighter and Encke felt his face heat, figuring he'd been too nosy with the reserved man. He knew he was married, had met his wife, Naomi, on shore leave once; a quiet Egyptian beauty that was proof opposites really did attract.

"We had two sons," Callisto finally answered. "But Naomi was not able to carry them past seven months. We hope to try again, when this tour ends. I promised her I would not re-enlist."

"Damn," Encke said softly, frowning down at his console without really seeing it. "I'm sorry, Cal. That's hard."

He shook himself and continued pulling up their flight path on his diagnostics screen. A few meteor showers and some solar flares but the gravitational pull this far out was weak.

"Yes," Callisto agreed quietly. "But to have a child of our own is my wife's greatest desire. And my greatest desire has always been her."

* * *

Encke thought about it as the prelaunch sequence continued, so ingrained in the muscle memory of his hands he scarcely had to look at what he was doing anymore. Maybe, this would be the last flight he'd take, the thought of moving on to another life after nearly seven years in the military both wonderful and terrifying. What did he even want to do? Go into law enforcement, he'd always thought, an easy step for most Alliance officers to make. What was his greatest desire?

A pale, tired face with a halo of white blond hair, resting on a pillow in their miserable little quarters came to mind. _Keeler_. It honestly didn't matter anymore what he did, or where they ended up, as long as they were together.

As a unit the five ships left the hangar bay and began patrol. Encke didn't really expect to find anything, the likelihood of the bastards laying conveniently in wait was too easy, and if he'd learned anything at this point, nothing in war was easy. A steady background chatter filtered through the inter ship link, he and Callisto quietly trading orders back and forth.

Cain and Praxis could be heard continuing the disagreement that started in the hangar bay.

"Cheetahs weren't dogs, dumbass," Praxis said, exasperated. "They were felines; members of the cat family—"

"Oh give it a rest, Cyclops; you've never so much as seen a friggin' _cat_."

"I've seen plenty of pussy, thank you very much."

"Ugh! TMI!" Puck could be heard; Oberon's deep bass laugh in the background behind him.

"I certainly hope you aren't planning on seeing anymore," Phobos retorted.

"Um, no, kitten."

Encke chuckled, shaking his head. He let the harmless bickering go; it broke the stress and made the time pass a little faster. He adjusted a monitor slightly so the structural integrity of the five ships displayed on his command console. All above 90%, the _Da Vinci_ had a small fluctuation in her aft shield and_ Ares_ seemed to be leaking some higher radiation levels.

"Aren't cheetah's extinct?" Ethos asked, and Encke was surprised to hear Callisto reply.

"Not entirely. There is a domesticated breed, descendants of the type the pharaoh's once tamed."

"Christ; history lesson time," Cain complained, but Callisto ignored him.

"We own two, a mated pair. Isis and Osiris."

"Really? Wow, Cal, that's so cool."

"Hey Myshonok; I know what I want for my next birthday!"

"I am not buying you any kind of cat."

"Guys, I'm allergic to cats. Can we get a dog instead?"

"Commander Encke, I'm picking up a fuel signature," Ethos said. "It could just be a scintillation effect in the _Tiberius'_ sensors…"

"_Ares,_ confirm," Encke said, and Callisto could be heard quietly giving orders to Abel for the _Reliant_ to swing the patrol out to follow Ethos' find.

"Confirmed, sir," Phobos said, "I'm picking up a….."

There was a long pause.

"Wow."

"Did you see that too?" Puck's excited voice.

"_Tiberius_, sweep coordinates at 30 degrees Azimuth—" Callisto ordered. Encke could hear the rapid input of commands across his console and the Navigators all communing over the comm link. Times like this the Fighter's job was downgraded to nose-picking or some other equally useless pursuit. Cain could be heard badgering Abel for answers; too headstrong to have learned when to lie back and shut up.

"Definitely a ship, commander." Ethos was trying to remain detached and professional though Praxis could be heard giving him kudos over the link.

"More like what's left of one," Abel said.

"I'm picking up more of it at Az 27 degrees," Puck added.

"Permission to take us in, sir?"

"Negative, _Ares; Reliant, Da Vinci_ , implement Delta five triangulation with _Tiberius_—"

"Oh, for the love of Mother, Callisto; overkill, much?" Phobos would have gotten his ears boxed if he'd been one of Encke's men for his tone alone.

"How kind of you to volunteer to dock and do a room by room search," Callisto responded mildly. "Confirm negative life scans?"

"Negative sir,"Ethos replied .

"There's organic matter but it's inanimate," Phobos added. A scientific description of dead bodies if Encke had ever heard one; or Phobos showing off again.

"Why's that boy have such a have such a hard on for you?" Encke asked Callisto quietly, a grin in his voice.

Callisto made a sound that was the verbal equivalent of a shrug. "Perhaps I slept with his sister in another life?" he suggested, deadpan, and Encke laughed.

"Permission to blast this heap to smithereens before I die of boredom,sirs?" Cain requested with a rather dramatic sigh.

"Yeah, I kinda have to take a whizz anywho."

"You were supposed to go before we got in the ship, _cher_i."

"I'm with Cain," Praxis said. "Looks like there's at least a piece for each of us to practice on?"

"The natives appear to be getting restless, " Callisto said over his shoulder.

"Them and me both, son. This our boy, then?"

"The ID matches that provided by the Colterons," Callisto said. He sounded somewhat distracted.

" 'But'?" Encke prompted.

Callisto didn't answer for a half a minute. "The ship appears to have destructed from within."

"Kamikaze?"

A pause. "An internal explosion. It was carrying a rather large supply of chlorine trifluoride, ClF3."

And Encke's heart suddenly leapt to his mouth.

"Oh," was the last thing he heard, almost as if Callisto was surprised. "Oh, my God…."


	9. Chapter 8 and three-quarters

Chapter 8&3/4

* * *

Okay it's probably a little late in the game for this, but hear me out:

I should have started this story with this preface in the first place. This story is **heavy, heavy on the OC's.** If that is not your thing, I respect that, but please stop reading now. In fact don't read any of my fics except for some of the one shots, because I have OC's in nearly all of them. I have a huge chapter devoted to Callisto coming up, and a huge chapter devoted to Puck and Oberon. If I eliminate those chapters this story will lose a lot of impact, and I'm proud of this story and worked hard on it, so I'm not willing to change the storyline at this point.

I wrote this story for two reasons: To challenge myself with a Long Fic (and figure out how to post chapters lol), and to wrap up the storylines of the OC's I had written. I have created a few more along the way but they are just bit players. I have tried not to let my OC's monopolize this story but sometimes I fail at that. This is in the end Encke's story, which is full circle for me too because the first fic I ever wrote, Task Name, is about him.

Thanks for listening—A2MOM


	10. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

* * *

Tornadoes actually do sound like a freight train, I have lived through three

There's a lot of scientific jargon here but I have no idea how accurate any of it is

* * *

_The skies of Kansas stretched over him, heavy with dark, silent clouds. The atmosphere was charged with rain, the scent of ozone hanging thick in the air. In the distance, way out past the Uncle Ezekiel's fields, a few jagged streaks of light crackled from the sky to earth and back again._

_Another flash, and Hector counted, one-one thousand; two-one thousand; three one thousand…..The wind kicked up, blowing the corn silk strands of hair around his face. Cooler; rushing, maybe there would be hail to collect and save in the refrigeration unit, to take to school tomorrow._

_Eight-one thousand; nine-one thousand… an ominous rumble, sounding like the snore of some great, sleeping beast. The sky amongst the clouds was shading a sickly green, like the bruise he had on his knee from falling out of the apple tree in the front yard. No more wind, just streaks of white electricity snapping silent in the distance; he counted to five-one thousand this time before the thunder came, louder, closer this time._

_The back porch door flew open and his sixteen year old older sister, Helen, yelled to him._

"_Hector! Mom says to get in here before it starts to rain!_

_The clouds twisted into a dark funnel over the endless acres of soybeans surrounding the house. A tree bent in the front yard, and a freight train of wind and sound suddenly rushed over him, coming closer, closer….._

* * *

The Klaxon's jolted him from sleep; disoriented, he sat up, gasping, "Encke?" but his lover wasn't in their bed.

"Energency Alert: All Non-Essential Personnel to the Hangar Deck, Prepare for Incoming Wounded; Senior Navigators to Central Command-"

He was still closing his jacket, barely had his feet in his boots when Porthos caught up to him, both of them running for the Bridge.

"Report," Keeler barked, Porthos shoving two ensigns out of the way at the lift, and pulling Keeler inside. He punched the emergency override and Keeler swayed back, bracing himself with his hands on the wall behind him as the car shot upwards without pausing for other floors.

"They found the enemy vessel dead in space two quads away," Porthos began, breathless himself and coiled tight with tension. "One, big, fucking dirty bomb full of Clf-3—"

His world constricted to a fist of pain in the center of his chest; too tight and not enough air—

"Keeler—Keeler!" Porthos had him by the shoulders and was shaking him, face hard but white with fear. "Goddammit, don't make me slap you, sir!"

"How—how many—are; did any one sur-survive?" Keeler gasped, willing himself not to faint. _Encke; Abel; Puck, oh please_ _no….!_

"Yes," Porthos said as the lift slowed. Keeler was out the door and running before it was all the way open. "I don't know how many, or who, but they're preparing for wounded, not just casualties."

They rounded the corner into Central, Keeler's lungs burning with exertion and terror. Could run a mile in just under six minutes, any day of the week except now, fuck! Why did he have to be sick _now_?!

"Status," Keeler snapped to the officer in charge. To the right of him, Porthos was taking the controls at the mainframe that linked to every Starfighter while in flight.

"All ships accounted for, sir!" the kid—Jax or Dax or something—said quickly, voice reedy with excitement and too young.

Keeler swung his face to Porthos sharply."Lifesigns?"

"Working on it," Porthos hovered tense over the controls and Keeler resisted the urge to go over and shake him now.

"I've got nine—"

Keeler bit his lips, hard, to keep from screaming.

"Two; no, three orbs off line, son of a _bitch_!" Porthos muttered under his breath for a few minutes, trying in vain to coax more information out of the hyperlink. "Baz; you down here?" he shouted without taking his eyes off his task.

Keeler saw Bazin with Copernicus at the opposite end of the bridge, both of them working on the long range sensors and finally bringing the huge, holographic display of the five ships into grim reality on the central view screen.

"Reroute more power to the shields; _Da Vinci's_ look the least damaged," Keeler said, eyes scanning the horrific sight and trying to figure out how to cast a net into the sea and bring his men home.

_Encke….please; please_….

"No response from the _Da Vinci's_ helm, sir," Bazin reported.

"Then reroute their power to _Tiberius_," Copernicus ordered briskly, striding to where Keeler stood and understanding his plan. He turned quickly to Keeler, the lines of his face hollow with stress.

"_Tiberius, Ares _and_ Da Vinci_ all have navigational capacity," he filled Keeler in quickly, as Porthos jogged over to help Bazin with the controls. "Puck isn't responding to hails; Oberon has tried to activate the automatic pilot but it hasn't come on line."

"Is Puck…?" Keeler started, choking back tears, but Copernicus shook his head.

"I have lifesigns on everyone but Callisto," he said bleakly. "Puck and Abel have been critically injured, but their suits are still operational. Cain is injured too."

He paused for a breath, before adding calmly, "Encke's life signs are very unstable, Keeler. I'm sorry. We have to get the team back in before they start losing structural integrity and life support."

"Emergency Tug?"

Copernicus shook his head. "That will take too long. Bering and Cook are in the hangar bay now, making preparations for the ships to be towed in under shield extension."

Not a pretty or an easy plan. Phobos and Ethos were both capable of executing it, depending on how injured they were. It was an enormous strain on the ship doing the towing, though, and could result in two vessels needing rescue instead of one.

There was an equally difficult task, and it was Keeler's : decide who got to come home first.

And who would have to wait.

Keeler licked his lips, feeling them cold, and numb. "Take the power from the prototype in the_ Reliant_," he looked back at the wide eyed Jax. "Is that still on line?"

"Yessir," the kid nodded.

"Alright," Keeler said briskly, taking a deep breath. "Porthos, can we extend shields from_ Tiberius_ around the _Reliant_?"

"Yes sir, looks like-"

"Do it," Keeler ordered, watching the schematic and seeing the faint green glow that represented the _Tiberius_' shields surround the _Reliant._

Too faint.

"Cut every non-essential system in the _Reliant_ and transfer that power to _Tiberius."_

Porthos stared at him "Sir, Cain and Abel are still alive in there-,"

"I'm perfectly aware of that," Keeler snapped. "Bazin, do you have communication with Ethos?"

"Yes Commander, but—"

"_Tiberius,_ this is Central Command, fall back to the _Sleipnir,"_

Ethos' gasping, pain filled sobs crackled over the link, the sounds of hissing circuitry and Praxis shouting over the link with Oberon and Deimos crackling in the back ground. Keeler saw Porthos cover his face with one of his large hands, and Bazin slowly stand and squeeze his shoulder in support.

"….Ethos, can you lock onto the _Reliant?"_ Keeler said, trying his best to remain calm and not further Ethos' distress. "We have your shields extended around her."

"Y-yes, Commander Keeler," Ethos gasped tremulously.

"Commander, I have communication open with _Da Vinci_; we can take her too and _Ares_ can take the _Scythe_—" Praxis shouted, still too faint over the link.

"Negative, _Tiberius,_ do not attempt salvage with _Da Vinci, Ares_ will take her in."

Keeler could see Ethos bringing the ship in and he cut communication with Praxis. Of the injured, Cain's lifesigns were the strongest; they would have to bring him in first. Puck was bad, but not as critical as Abel, whose suit monitor had gone from flashing orange to red.

Encke's life signs had progressed to blue the last time Keeler had looked. He couldn't bring himself to see if they had stilled to white, like Cal's.

Copernicus had opened communications with the hangar deck. "Commander Cook says bay one is clear, they've moved the rest of Blue Team to make room for an emergency landing."

Keeler nodded, forcing himself to focus on the immediate objective. Two ships returning, two more to follow.

"_Ares,_ move into position with _Da Vinci_ and prepare for shield extension." Phobos was already sliding the ship sleekly within range of the crippled _Da Vinci_, which was spewing super-heated coolant from her aft engine at an alarming rate.

Keeler could see what Phobos was planning before he even signaled Central, positioning the_ Ares_ directly between the _Da Vinci_ and the almost ruined _Scythe_.

"_Ares_ to Central command," Phobos called out. His voice was strong but with an edge of barely controlled hysteria. "We can bring the _Scythe_ in too; we have enough power to—"

"Negative, _Ares_!" Keeler barked. "Fall back and return to base immediately."

"Commander, I have enough power," Deimos now, coughing, with each gaping breath. "The _Da Vinici_ can help boost our-"

"This is NOT a debate, gentlemen!" Keeler shouted, furious and aware that every eye on the bridge was staring at him. "Another argument from either of you and I will bring you up on charges of insubordination! Get back here STAT; we'll come back for the _Scythe_-!"

"Keeler," Phobos cut across his tirade, sounding livid. "The _Scythe_ won't last that long. Her life support is almost out, and there's only half of her left!"

Phobos, paused, taking in a gasping breathe that could be emotion or pain. "You have to trust me, and we're wasting time, so let me fucking_ do_ this if you ever want to see Encke alive again!"

Deimos could be heard cursing at Phobos in Russian; probably for digging their disciplinary graves even deeper.

"Proceed, _Ares_," Keeler relented. "We'll be waiting for you."

* * *

The landing struts had barely engaged and Praxis had the dome off the cockpit, jerking out of his harness and scrambling over the seat to get to his Navigator.

"We're back, you did it kiddo;_ fucking-A_, what a piece of flying that was!" His eye scanned Ethos rapidly for injuries; he was white faced with pain but aside from a split lip, wasn't bleeding anywhere.

"All-all with a broken wrist, too," Ethos gasped, and then shook his head violently when Praxis started undoing his harness. "Don't! I'm not hurt that bad, I can wait—"

Praxis ignored him. "C'mon, I'll help you out at least." He started to slip an arm under Ethos to move him only to have him cry out shrilly in agony.

"Can't-!" His face was grey. "Leg-leg's broken."

Fuck. "Which one?" Praxis asked urgently, quickly running through the options for a method of extraction from the mangled cockpit that would hurt the least.

"Both—I'm pretty sure they both are." Ethos squeezed his eyes shut and sweat began to pour down his face; breath shallow and too fast. Shock.

Praxis craned his head around in vain for help but the extraction team was swarming over the_ Reliant_, shouting orders and all the time Cain's broken screams of pain were setting his teeth on edge. He turned back to Ethos, getting an arm around his back and one under his thighs.

"Never leave your partner behind," Praxis said, straining with the effort to lift Ethos. He was pretty sure he'd knocked a disc out of alignment somewhere in his lower back, but he'd been injured worse. "I'm sorry, kiddo; this is gonna hurt."

Someone was on his side, because he managed to lift Ethos in one smooth pull. Ethos cried out in agony once, and passed out in his arms.

Help was waiting as he made it down the ladder.

"I got him," Porthos said, taking Praxis' burden from him, tight-lipped and expression distressed. "Is he-?"

Praxis shook his head. "Broken; legs and at least one arm, he's fixable, so get him out of here before Sickbay gets too full." Porthos didn't stick around to be told twice.

* * *

Praxis limped over to the wreckage of what was once the _Reliant_. They had just pulled Abel, unconscious, from the cockpit.

He made the mistake of looking.

"Fuck!" He cried, quickly averting his head from the mangled body. "Oh; Jesus!"

"We need some help up here!" one of the medics with Cain shouted. Without thinking, Praxis got himself up the ladder—bent, like the rest of the ship—and over to where the two medics were struggling to extricate Cain. God almighty, the lower half of his suit was still smoking.

" _Puzhalsta_! Oh please; fuck I'm _burning_!"

"Get his arm out for me," one of the medics ordered, and Praxis caught and steadied Cain's thrashing right arm. The medic quickly cut away the heavy material of the sleeve, exposing Cain's clammy skin. Cain was so tense his veins were already distended; the medic prepped his skin and slid the needle into his vein with ease, dispersing a cc of something that made Cain's screams turn to tearful whimpers, his eyes glazed.

"Thanks," the medic said gruffly as together the three men lifted Cain from his seat. "Most guys pass out when they see needles."

Cain was limp by the time they laid him on the stretcher to rush to sickbay.

Praxis turned to see the medic run the diagnostic scanner over his body quickly. "Well pal, you've got one helluva hard head; nothing major's wrong, but I'm sure you feel like shit. Sorry, but you're gonna have to wait a bit."

* * *

The _Reliant_ was jettisoned to make way for the three incoming ships. Cook gave the order himself without pause. Praxis couldn't help but wonder what Cain and Abel would say, to know the ship that had almost become their coffin was now just another piece of space garbage waiting for the scrapyard.

He waited tensely behind the shields, when the bay doors were opened for the _Ares_ to bring in her sister ships. It was a breathtaking piece of flying, and Praxis felt immensely proud of his lover for achieving it. As soon as the doors were sealed again, he dashed out with the others to help with the wounded.

The _Scythe_—how anyone could still be alive in it was incredible. The nose of the ship—where the Navigator sat—was completely fused. When the exhaust from the five Starfighter's had ignited the Clf-3, Callisto had turned the _Scythe_ directly into the blast. Praxis understood his motives, the_ Scythe_ was closest, and had next to no chance of surviving anyway. But she could take the brunt of the terrible, corrosive chemical fire, giving the four other ships a chance to survive. Callisto, and Encke, were heroes. Praxis hoped in their place, he'd be half as brave.

Speaking of bravery…..He couldn't believe what he saw when the he came around the front of the _Ares._

Her aft had been torn away, a gaping hole rent from the instrument console to the hatch. By some miracle, the orb was untouched, and there had been enough power for the ship to engage its automatic internal shields, which prevented its crew, for a very short time, from being sucked out into space. Phobos had piloted all of the ships home with only an invisible bubble separating him from the terrifying view of open space.

The hatch section where Deimos sat was untouched, and a billowing cloud of acrid smoke was released into the hangar bay as it was raised. It was immediately sucked into the vents high overhead, and then the medics had swarmed Deimos, pumping him with triox so he could breathe.

Praxis swung around to the front of the ship, the shields now disengaged.

"Kitten, it's over Baby; you did it," Praxis soothed Phobos, who sat shaking from head to toe, ashen faced. ""You're safe now; you're okay."

He hurriedly unfastened Phobos' harness as he asked, teeth chattering, "D-D-Deimos?"

"Okay, kitten; he's okay."

"Oh," Phobos said quietly, then his face screwed up in misery, and he began to cry.

* * *

Puck was completely unmarked; not a bruise on him, but when they pulled him out of the_ Da Vinci_, he was seizing uncontrollably. Oberon was distraught; and it was the mess hall, and Kratos, all over again, except that Oberon was a lot bigger and almost impossible to restrain. He was hurt too, blood in sticky dark rivulets pouring down his face from a horrible gash in his head. It took Cassius, in a rare moment of ire to get in his face and order him to stand down.

"They can't work on him with you in the way!" Cassisus had shouted, hands on Oberon's straining shoulders as he fought the hold the MP's had him in. "Let them do their job; or I'll have you removed to the brig!"

"_Pardonnez-moi_," Oberon sobbed, ashamed, and Praxis stayed with him until they could all depart for sickbay together.

By the time they left, the MP's forcing Oberon and Praxis out, they were still cutting Encke out of the _Scythe._


	11. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

* * *

**Warning: Graphic descriptions of trauma ahead**

* * *

Flashes of sound, voices; all talking, shouting at once. Grey-black silence, sickening; a deep headlong fall down a cliff of dizziness. The strident alarm of a heart monitor and someone screaming, screaming as if they're being disemboweled. It reeks of smoke, of charred flesh, the smell filling Encke's sinuses and coating his teeth, the back of his throat.

His mouth is full of blood.

He wakes up again, the alarm has been shut off and he can hear someone crying; he opens his eyes but it's hard to turn his head. He's immobilized, sealed in a shock suit to stop the hemorrhaging from his left femoral artery, but he won't learn about that until later. Shifting his line of vision to the right, he sees the diagnostic monitors in sickbay, medics with their choppy, practiced movements and incomprehensible jargon muddling his brain.

"Oberon; Oberon," Puck is sobbing, from somewhere to Encke's right. He sounds delirious with pain, or drugs, or fear; Encke isn't sure.

The room is grey, and he's very, very cold.

"Pressure's dropping; right, let's give him another 3 units of PRBC's, a 5-pack of Platelets-"

"Get that line wide open; I need a pressure bag, godammit-!

"Start Dopamine 20mcqs per kg; I need OR 1 on standby-"

"O-Oberon! Where are you-?!"

"The Thoracotomy's in OR 1, Dr. Patel; we could move him to OR 4 in about 15; they just moved the—"

"I am here, Puck; right here—," Oberon sounds distraught. Encke blacks out for a few moments then awakens suddenly when the screamer wrenches a cry of agony that trails off into a hitching litany of curses in Russian.

"—Losing him; we're losing-!"

"Oberon!" Puck sounds terrified and Oberon is sobbing, asking 'why, why doesn't he know me?' but Encke doesn't have an answer.

His pressure bottoms out. A new alarm wails and then, more movement, frantic. Someone has their hand over his face, and then there's no more air.

* * *

He opens his eyes. Sickbay is spread out below him, a noisy, chaotic nightmare of pain and blood.

Keeler is helping a team of medics restrain Cain, as they grimly laser free the flight suit that's melted into both his legs from mid-thigh to his feet; piece by piece by piece. The scent of eschar is chokingly thick and Cain's face, chalk white from drugs and shock and pain, is damp with sweat. Tendrils of his blue-black hair curl against his cheek as he turns his face into Keeler's arms, which are locked around his chest from behind, screaming in pain.

Puck is lying on a diagnostic bed, or he would be if he wasn't fighting to get free. A thin trickle of blood is leaking from his left ear. As he writhes and screams for Oberon, his nose starts to bleed too. His pretty, blue eyes are unfocused and one of his pupils is blown wide, blacking out the iris completely. The sclera of both eyes are stained red. Oberon looks far worse, forehead gashed and bleeding, tears streaking the coolant on his face as he tries in vain to calm his thrashing lover.

Abel isn't anywhere to be seen.

Ethos is on a cot, drugged into merciful oblivion, both legs and one arm sealed in regenerator casts. Praxis waits with him, bent painfully over his bed in a posture that screams of a badly injured back.

Deimos' entire face is black with soot, his suit charred and still smoking in a few places, hair singed on the right side of his head. One arm is in a makeshift sling. The other is tight around Phobos, who sits beside Deimos on a cot far from the circle of madness, waiting. Phobos is unmarred, but he's sunken down in Deimos' arms, cheek pressed to Deimos' chest, eyes staring at nothing. His face is as white as his suit, flecks of coolant decorating his hair, and he's shaking so hard, the cot and Deimos are vibrating with him.

The code team swarms around a bed at the far end of the room. The body on the bed looks familiar, and Encke realizes with very little surprise, it's him.

Puck is flailing his arms in panic. Oberon stops him just before he can rip out his IV, and Puck punches him, hard, across the face.

Encke feels the blow in the center of his own chest; it feels like being tackled on the football field back in high school. With a gasp he sucks air into his lungs, eyes flying open to see the ceiling of sickbay again, the faces of the medics shouting and working on him.

"Stay with us, Encke; you hear that?" one of the Doctors says firmly, but it's hard to hear because Puck is still crying, crying for Oberon.

Cain isn't screaming anymore. Encke can't hear anything, and his vision begins to tunnel inward, grey and cold and dark.

* * *

It took the team in OR 1 nearly three hours to repair the laceration in Abel's thoracic aorta, evacuate the blood from his pleural space, and seal the fractures in his sternum and ribcage. Both collar bones-snapped when his safety harness prevented him from being decapitated-were fused with Bone Cement , the punctures in his lungs closed and his circulation washed free of emboli. He would carry a small, white scar in the center of his chest the rest of his days, a pale star to remind him of the day he nearly became one of them forever.

Phobos was actually triaged before Deimos could have his crushed right arm repaired. Nearly catatonic with shock by the time a team could be spared, it took the combined strength of three men twice his size to forcibly peel him free from his panicked grip on Deimos. In the end Deimos just stayed with him while he had his flight suit cut away to check for injuries.

Coolant had leaked inside a tear just under Phobos' left arm, likely from when the top half of the ship had been peeled open like a tin can. To his horror, Deimos saw the acidic fluid had eaten an ugly, bubbled path along Phobos' rib cage and down his left flank. Phobos never uttered a sound when the wound was disinfected and the acid neutralized, staring hollow eyed while Deimos wept, face pressed to his filthy hair.

" Ангел мой! (My angel!)," Deimos cried, over and over, sick with the knowledge that Phobos had sat and waited, all that while in horrible pain. He waited, until Praxis arrived and took his place.

"I've got him; get your arm looked at," Praxis said firmly when Deimos still wouldn't leave his Navigator's side.

"I didn't know," Deimos cried miserably, "Please, Praxis; I would have—"

Praxis pulled him into a quick one armed hug. "Deimos don't cry, it's okay," he whispered gruffly. "Now get your goddamn arm looked at before you end up like Encke."

"Wha-what does that mean?" Deimos pleaded as he was shoved into a stretcher and wheeled away. "Praxis! What's happened to Encke?!"

* * *

Dr. Patel gave them the catalog of injuries: Coup Contrecoup TBI, signaling the end of Puck's days as a pilot. Cain with 3rd degree chemical burns to 40% of his body. Flail chest injury to Abel. Shock, broken bones, chemical burns and smoke inhalation.

His old friend, Callisto, dead; incinerated in the ship so that there weren't even ashes to ship back home to his wife.

And then there was their Lead Fighter; an unstoppable force of a young, strong man who could have made Admiral someday, now likely to never walk again.

Why he should still live, already having lived and done so much, Elias Cook would never know.

"Tell us what you need," Niels offered, and the exhausted physician gave a wry smile.

"A clock, with hands to turn back," Patel wished, shaking his head sadly. "Barring that, I need time; I need blood; and I need any capable set of hands that you gentlemen care spare."

Elias was already shrugging of his jacket. "I'll start with the needle, you go see to your Fighter, Niels." He looked at the short Indian doctor fearlessly. "You should know, Pranav, that I detest needles."

The grey haired man managed a smile. "On that, my friend, we can agree."

* * *

As long as he kept his eyes closed, it didn't hurt. Someone was singing one of the prayers the nuns at school sang; the words were in Latin, not Russian, but the melody was the same.

Holy Mary, Mother of God/Pray for us sinners/Now and at the Hour of our Death/Amen.

Cain was a sinner, and if this was indeed the hour of his death, he was in deep shit.

He cracked his eyes to see a bent, blond head; saw the soiled dressings on his legs changed by knowing hands. Relief flooded through him and it wasn't just because the pain was mostly gone. If Abel was well enough to be tending to his wounds, he wasn't half as injured as Cain feared he was.

"Hey, Princess," he said, voice rusty from screaming and inhaling coolant and smoke. "Here to give me my sponge bath?"

The singing stopped, and an innocent, round face looked up at him in surprise. "Oh, Cain!" Ethos smiled, though there were dried tear-tracks all over his puffy face. "You're awake. I hope I'm not hurting you too bad; if you want, I can get the nurse-?"

"Where's Abel?!" Cain interrupted, starting to rise off the bed.

"He's in post-op," Ethos told him, pressing his shoulders back to the bed with surprising strength. Or maybe Cain was as doped up as he felt, too pussied out on narcs to fight off some sissy Nav that belonged to Cyclops. "He'll be okay, but he needs a few hours to wake up."

A few hours? The fuck-? "Get me Myshonok, then; gimmie someone that can get me some fucking answers, goddammit!"

Ethos shook his head. "Deimos is having his arm regenerated. Everyone's busy tending to the other wounded."

"So why'd I get stuck with you?" Cain demanded, fear and anger making his heart pound in his chest. _Other Wounded_. Holy shit…

Ethos gave him a hard look. "Because you need these dressings to stay sterile and wet, or you'll get something called 'Necrotizing fasciitis', and everyone else is busy with people hurt worse than you; and because _I volunteered_."

Cain glared up at him, weak and shaky with rage just from trying to get up out of bed. "Good for you, Nurse Nancy; now get me Keeler or somebody that knows what the fuck's going on around here!"

Ethos' face went splotchy with anger. He threw the dressings down into the sterile tray, yanked off his treatment gloves, and stomped towards the door. Cain expected him to barge through it, probably to run off to snivel to Praxis that Cain was mean to him, but Ethos shut the door instead.

Then he turned around, and marched back to the bed.

"Now you listen to me, you little bastard," Ethos began, furious; voice harder than Cain had ever heard it before. "Half our squadron just got cut to ribbons out there, and sickbay's been staffed by all available hands for the past eight hours. I haven't eaten or slept since we got back. And since everyone else is busy, taking care of the dead, and half dead, and 'wish-I –was-dead-because-it-hurts-so-bad'; you got _stuck_ with _me_. And you might not like it, or me, but I don't give a damn. I'm going to finish dressing your legs, and you're going to lay there and shut up and let me do it, because that's what I was told by Dr. Patel to do. You have a problem with that, shut your mouth and deal with it!"

And with that he sat down again, disinfected his hands, pulled on another pair of gloves, and started draping Cain's legs in wet dressings once again. Cain watched in stunned silence for several minutes, during which time Ethos completely ignored him.

"What happened to Abel?" he demanded after a few more minutes had passed, when it became evident that Ethos was going to make him beg. Probably throw another hissy for an apology or something; as if. If Cain wasn't so paralyzed with dread—

"The Reliant was slammed by the blast wave and the cockpit was destroyed. When the orb exploded, shrapnel…crushed Abel's chest. He lost a lot of blood, and something…something happened to his heart…"

Ethos trailed off when Cain covered his face with his hands and started to cry. It was coming back in flashes of ugly, white-hot fire; the wrecked ship just blowing up in their faces like the gas sometimes exploded in the iron mines back home; gravity gone and globules of lime green coolant and blood floating like lazy soap bubbles on a summer breeze. The stink of fire, exhaust vents kicking in, lungs searing as he sucked in acrid oxygen with every shriek of pain, screaming Abel's name until his throat bled.

Abel had never made a sound.

"Abel will recover; he'll be okay, they fixed all of his injuries .Deimos' right arm was crushed and he took in a lot of smoke, but he'll be okay too."

The cot dipped, and Ethos snapped his gloves off again, reaching for Cain's arm. Blindly, Cain groped for him and Ethos clasped his hand tightly.

"Phobos got coolant burns; he'll have to get some cloned tissue transplants but Praxis is pretty sure he won't have too bad a scar. It's on his chest, anyway, he'd have been so pissed off if it'd been his face, don't you think?"

Cain's shoulders shook in a miserable attempt at a laugh. "Praxis….?"

"Is okay," Ethos said quietly. "Ruptured a disc in his back but that took maybe fifteen minutes to repair. _Tiberius_ is totaled, she took a bad hit to her landing gear, we had a helluva time setting her down in the hangar bay."

Cain looked at Ethos through blurry eyes. "You? Did you get hurt?"

Ethos shrugged. "Stress fractures in both my lower legs; snapped both my wrists too. Only took a half an hour to heal, but I couldn't walk and Porthos had to carry me all the way from the hangar bay." His blushed. "He's really strong, you know?"

Cain gave a lopsided smile, which quickly fell away as Ethos haltingly explained how Puck had a head injury from the violent impact of the ship, shaking him so that his brain bounced back and forth within his skull. He'd had surgery, but hadn't woken yet, and the Doctors were worried. Oberon's injuries had looked worse; a horrid gash to his forehead that he'd refused to have treated until Puck could be stabilized, broken fingers on his left hand, a bruised kidney and some internal GI bleeding. Which left only one ship Ethos hadn't told him about.

"The _Scythe_ took the worst of it," Ethos told him quietly. "We towed her back in, but as soon as they removed Encke, they had to jettison her and destroy her. She was leaking too much fuel….."

"Ethos," Cain said haltingly, half a threat and half a plea, "if you get to the fucking point—"

"Encke's really bad," Ethos said miserably, looking away. "He's been in surgery a long time….He—His heart stopped once and they almost couldn't bring him back….Even if he lives, he might—might not walk again."

Ethos looked down, and finished brokenly, "We lost Cal. He never…They didn't even try, when the _Scythe_ was brought in, there wasn't any hope. Keeler's….having a really hard time with it, you know?"

Cain looked away, eyes squeezed shut in misery as he wept anew at the horrific litany Ethos had just recited. Encke…fighting for his fucking life, it sounded like it. And Cal, fuck, if humanity was going to rebuild itself after the war, they sure as hell could've used more minds like his. What a waste.

It could just have easily been Keeler. Cain couldn't even begin to wrap his mind around that.

He didn't know how long he lay there, in the stupid short infirmary gown with his legs bright red from the hyper replicating cloned skin. Ethos didn't say any more, just sat looking old and tired and let Cain keep holding his hand.

"Jesus," Cain said eventually, swiping at his eyes. Silently, Ethos handed him one of the dry dressings to clean the snot off his face. "And here I was, thinking this fucking war was over. Too bad Callisto's not here to tell me how fucking stupid I am."

"I can tell you, if you want?" Ethos said earnestly, and Cain gave a watery laugh as the poor kid realized what he'd said a beat later, clapping a hand over his mouth in horror.

" 'S'okay, Baby; you'd be right anyway." Cain looked sadly at the young Navigator, who wasn't so young anymore. Fuck.

"Um, I should probably get back to work," Ethos said, releasing Cain's hand.

Cain sat forward and fumbled with the bed to raise the head rest. "There's nothing wrong with my arms, I can do it myself. But I gotta take a piss first. "

Ethos helped him swing his legs over the side of the bed, letting him sit for a minute until his head stopped spinning. Cain put his bare feet on the floor with something close to wonder. A few hours ago, he didn't think he'd have legs, let alone be able to walk, ever again.

"I suppose my ass is hanging outta this thing?" he complained, as Ethos slung a surprisingly strong arm around his shoulder and helped him shuffle to the head.

In response, Ethos looked over Cain's shoulder, face unreadable for several long minutes. "Maybe," he agreed with a cheeky grin.

* * *

Praxis poked his head in when Ethos was helping him back to bed.

"Hey; you're up," he observed unnecessarily. "Ooo; hospital gown. Nice ass, Cain." The smile didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Well you oughta know, Cyclops," Cain growled, causing Praxis to blush and Ethos to glance between them curiously. He grunted a bit in pain as Ethos helped him ease back into bed, his new skin sunburn-tight.

"We're doin' fine," he said, smacking Praxis' hands aside when he hurried over to help. "Ethos' got this under control."

While Ethos blushed, Cain situated himself in bed and drew the dressing supplies closer. "Take your Navie to the mess, if you wanna be helpful," he said, waving them both towards the door. "Poor kid's been on his feet all damn day."

They had almost left, when Cain looked up again. "Ethos?" The kid paused, and Cain gave him an honest smile.

"You've got a nice voice, Baby. Thanks for singing for me." He grinned, enjoying the way Ethos blushed scarlet to the roots of his fluffy blond hair.

Then he was alone, and set to work dressing his legs. The faster he could walk on his own, the faster he could go find Myshonok, and Princess.


	12. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

* * *

Callisto and Naomi were inspired by The Thin White Duke and Iman

Callisto's name is from one of Bowie's most famous roles

Milk and Molasses enemas will never go out of fashion

* * *

"It is with great sorrow that I must inform you of…Dear Mrs. Stone; I am saddened to have to tell you of the death of your husband..."

Keeler closed his eyes, leaning back in his chair in his office in central command, battling a fresh wave of tears.

"Time," he asked thickly, and the computer's monotone voice rang out "04:36 hundred hours, 12.5 seconds."

"Start personal message recording." He cleared his throat, steepled his hands before his face, and began.

"My dearest Naomi; this is a message I had never hoped to send to you. Your husband, and my friend, Jareth, died today; killed in the line of duty while defending the men, women and children of Colony 6 after a Colteron attack. He died piloting my ship, the_ Scythe_, in my place, while I was ill. He died saving the life of my Fighter, and he died when it should have been me. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me, and that when we return to Earth I can personally tell you what Jareth meant to me; as a mentor, a pilot, and a friend. He can never mean as much to me, as he did to you, but I loved him, and I will miss him every day for the rest of my life. Please know that while he was stationed here on the _Sleipnir_, you were in his every waking thought, and in all of his dreams. I know, because he told me how much he loved you. Please, Naomi; please know that he gave his life doing what he thought was right, and because of his actions, his was the only fatality our team suffered today. In my sincerest, deepest sympathy; Commander Keeler, Battleship Sleipnir, 7th Alliance Fleet."

Keeler took a breath, said quietly, "End recording, affix signature and send."

The echoes of his guilt rang in the hollow, empty room, making his eyes prick with fresh tears. For a few moments, he allowed his misery to clog his throat, to spill over his cheeks and to furrow his brow in pain. When he was done, he sealed the box on his desk containing Callisto's personal affects to send home to his wife.

Inside were his uniform and insignia; commendations and orders; and the three holo images Keeler had found in his room: His graduating class from the Academy, which included Commander Cook; a picture of he and Juno grinning in the cockpit of the _Veyron_, and a picture from his wedding day, gazing at his beautiful bride with love in his eyes. All that was left of a gifted man who now left behind a lonely, childless widow, but it was the best Keeler could do.

Then he straightened, tucked the box under his arm and wiped his eyes. He would have the rest of his life to mourn. For now, he had a duty to do.

* * *

Abel was in a room with Puck, both of them hooked up to a fuckton of machinery with flashing lights and the rhythmic bleeps and beeps that meant they were at least still breathing. More tubes and lines than Cain could count ran from each of them into separate medication pumps, which a burly nurse was checking and adjusting while looking at their vital sign monitors.

He glared at Cain, seated in a purloined wheelchair he'd maneuvered himself all the way across the infirmary in. "You got twenty minutes. You wake either one of 'em up, you'll be getting a nice warm dose of milk and molasses. Got it?"

There were many ways Cain could answer that, but as the nurse was even bigger than Encke, he smiled and said, "I'll behave, sir."

The big man scowled. "Goddamn right you well. And don't wake_ him_ up either," he said lowly, jerking at thumb at Puck's bed. "If that big bugger asks me one more time when his '_Cheri_' is gonna wake up, I'm gonna pitch him ass first out the nearest airlock."

Cain waited until the nurse had stomped off out of earshot. "Have a nice day, asshole!" he waved cheerfully. Then he carefully wheeled himself over to where Oberon lay half draped over Puck's leg's, snoring slightly.

"Oberon; hey, wake up," he whispered, shaking his shoulder. He was rewarded with a grunt as Oberon came to, blinking in confusion.

"Whoa, wicked scar, pal," Cain grinned, staring with approval at the painful looking gash that ran across Oberon's forehead. "You'll score big time with the Babes with that!"

Oberon shot him a grumpy look. "I hope you have disturbed my sleep for a better reason than encouraging me to practice _infidélité_," he yawned, stretching his back stiffly.

"Yeah, I wanna know if Princess' woke up yet," Cain asked quietly, nodding his head in Abel's direction. "Every time I try to get information outta any of these Rottweiler nurses, they keep threatening to make me drink milk and molasses." He made a face. "As disgusting as that sounds, I am getting kinda hungry."

Oberon stared at him, then he grinned, chuckling nastily. "You do not drink it, _estipid._ They pour it in your _derrière_ if you are a naughty boy, to make you shit." At Cain's horrified look, he shrugged. "_Grand'maman_ was a nurse, too."

"Good think I didn't come play at your house when I was a kid," Cain retorted. He looked worriedly at Abel's sleeping form. "Will I get in trouble if I go say hi to Princess?"

Oberon's expression softened. "_Non_, just be gentle, _Caïn_," he said. He leaned over to give Puck a kiss on the cheek, then stood. "I will be right back, my little firey one," he murmured, before leaving to go find the head.

Cain looked back at Abel, wheeling himself alongside his bed. "Hey, Princess; can you hear me?" he said softly, caressing Abel's pale cheek with his hand. It was hard to believe the litany of injuries Ethos had recited had really happened, looking at Abel's serene, sleeping face. He was paler than usual, to be sure, and he had a big thing wrapped around his torso that looked kind of like a corset.

Cain didn't even want to think about what was under that big ass bandage, and why.

Oberon came back a moment later, two bottled waters in his hands. Wordlessly, he gave one to Cain before resuming his vigil at his husband's bedside.

"Maybe he'll wake up if I kiss him?" Cain asked miserably, fingers lightly touching Abel's hair.

Oberon sighed behind him. "Puck did not," he answered quietly. "I have already tried."

* * *

Cain and Deimos were released from sickbay the following day. Abel stayed another forty-eight hours, having awoken a remarkable six hours after surgery, asking for water.

He remembered nothing of the explosion. After telling him the least amount of details possible, he had fallen back into a drug-induced slumber.

As they walked back to Deimos' quarters, Cain asked gently, "Myshonok, if I'd had my face burned up, instead of my legs, would you still love me?"

Deimos glared at him. "Of course, you complete idiot," he snapped. "You think I am that shallow?"

"Tch. What if it'd been my dick?"

Deimos paused. "Let me think about that, _lubovnik_."

Cain grinned from ear to ear, slinging an arm around Deimos' shoulder as they walked back to Cain and Abel's room. "Hah! Glad to know you don't have any brain damage either!"

* * *

Puck awakened when Doctor Patel came for morning rounds, swearing and knocking the doctor's hand aside when he shone a light in his eyes. Both pupils were back to normal size and his sclera were largely white.

"Get that mother fucking thing out of my face," Puck growled, turning his head in irritation.

Oberon was mortified. "_Cheri_! Do not use such language." He fought to still Puck's hands as he again tried to rip out his IV.

"Don't touch me!" Puck yelled, flailing in panic. "Oberon! Help me!"

"Puck, I am here, oh _mon dieu_ why don't you know me?!" The nurses stepped in but Puck went wild, screaming and catching poor Dr. Patel in the face with his foot.

"No, no, this is a positive sign," Patel assured Oberon when he joined him outside the room, while Puck screamed obscenities that made even Oberon blush. The doctor calmly dabbed at his bleeding nose with a cloth. "If he can kick, there is no paralysis from the head injury."

"But he does not know me," Oberon said bleakly, wincing as he heard a loud crash. Puck had finally succeeded in knocking over his IV pole it seemed. "Is he…is he no longer normal?"

"He needs a bit more time for the swelling to go down in his brain before we can be completely certain," the doctor replied frankly. "We are limited to which sedatives we can give him so as not to mask any symptoms of further deterioration, but given the state of his agitation we shall try a light relaxant so that he does not harm himself or anyone else."

Oberon stared down at the little man. Throughout that whole speech, he had only heard one word.

_Deterioration._

With a sympathetic pat on the arm, Patel had one final order. "You must rest now yourself, if you are to be strong for when he needs you."

* * *

After a miserable three hours of tossing and turning in their quarters, Oberon returned to sickbay. Puck was sitting up in bed, pale and tired. He smiled sweetly when Oberon looked warily into the room.

"Hi, sweetie," he sniffled. He'd been crying, sitting there with Phobos of all people at his bedside. They'd been talking quietly when Oberon arrived, and Oberon knew Phobos had told Puck everything that had happened from the guilty look on the _Ares_ Navigator's face.

"How much trouble am I in?" Phobos asked warily, standing as Oberon came and gave Puck a brief kiss.

But Oberon smiled gratefully. "_Non, cheri_; you have saved me from a most difficult task, and I thank you."

He pulled Phobos into a quick hug before the flustered man could make his escape.

Puck looked at him, crying, as Oberon sat beside him on the bed. "Ph-Pobos said Callisto didn't make it?" he asked miserably. "And Encke is—is—"

He started to cry in earnest, wincing and holding his head in his hands. "Ow, ow, oh Obie it hurts!"

"_Oui, cheri_," Oberon whispered as he sat and pulled Puck into his arms, his relief at seeing his lover with his memory intact almost overwhelming him. "Hush; do not cry my sweet angel, I am here. I will care for you."

He closed his dark eyes in sorrow, leaning back against the headboard exhausted and heartsick, Puck clinging to him. "I tell you this, Cheri." Oberon kissed the top of his head. "This war is _fini, _for you, and me. I will not let them put you in harm's way any longer. And as long as I may live, I will never kill; ever, again."

* * *

Oberon took Puck back to their quarters the following day. Puck was his old self; outwardly at least, save for some sensitivity to light and a mild headache. He was restricted from duty until his postop checkup the following week, when he would find out if he'd need to remain on anticonvulsant therapy the rest of his life.

If so, he'd never fly again.

Oberon fluttered and fussed and treated him like he was a baby bird, blown from its nest by the wind. The worst came when Puck curled against him in their bed, eyes heavy lidded and needy.

"Obie…..?" he whispered at his husbands ear, breathing in the scent of the skin along his throat. He pressed his groin to Oberon's powerful thigh and clambered over him to kiss his lush mouth, moaning as their tongues thrust together. Until he realized Oberon was just laying there, not touching him, not kissing him back.

"What's wrong?" Puck asked when Oberon gently pushed him away, his eyes full of hurt.

Oberon's worried eyes searched his face, one hand tentatively brushing his hair back from the place his scalp had been shaved. He swallowed, and looked away.

"It is best, we do not become intimate tonight, Puck," Oberon said quietly. In disbelief, Puck watched him roll out of bed, clad in shorts and obviously limp, when Puck was hard and leaking. Or had been, until he was so kindly rejected.

Oberon looked down at him sadly. "Sleep tonight, _cheri_. We both need time to heal."

And with that, he took the ladder and settled into the top bunk, leaving Puck stunned and speechless, staring up from the bunk below.

* * *

Three days after surgery, Encke announced his return to consciousness by pulling out his ET tube. Alarms wailed across the medical bay, and his exasperated nurse hurried to his bedside to make sure he hadn't ripped out his vocal cords as well.

"You know, Commander," the silver haired man said, running a diagnostic scan and making a few adjustments to Encke's intravenous pump settings, "you are one pain in the ass patient."

The sedatives spread a blanket of warmth and laziness through Encke's bones. With a woozy grin, he flipped the nurse off briefly, before sleep claimed him again.

* * *

Six hours later, Keeler's beautiful face was the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes.

"Gotta piss," Encke rasped, the pain meds making his tongue stick to the roof of his mouth. Restlessly, his hand fumbled at his crotch and encountered the hard shell of a regenerator unit. "Whad'd I do, break m'dick?"

"I love you too," Keeler said wryly, leaning over to press a kiss to the top of Encke's sweaty head. "Your dick is fine, sweetheart."

"Yeah, but is it broken? Can't-can't have no honeymoon if damn things broken."

When Keeler didn't answer, Encke tried to focus on his face a little harder. And then he saw Bering, seated beside Keeler, wearing the same strained expression as his lover. Shit.

He licked his lips, and knocked Keeler's hand away when he tried to fuss at him with some stupid little pink sponge on a stick, dipped in water.

"Must not be good news, if I'm lookin' at you, too," Encke said, looking steadily at his commanding officer. "What's inside this fuckin' regen unit, sir? Or what's not in it?"

Bering looked at Keeler, who bit his lip and quickly shook his head. He squeezed his eyes shut and two, fat tears rolled down his cheeks.

Cold fear settled like a block of ice in Encke's gut. "They both gone?" he asked quietly.

"Just the left, son," Bering answered gently, and Keeler pressed a hand to his mouth, shoulders shaking with silent tears. "Your right leg will be good as new in another 24 hours or so. They couldn't save the left."

Encke stared at him. "How—how much is gone?"

Bering did him the courtesy of not bullshitting around. "You've lost all but twelve centimeters below the thigh, son. I'm sorry, James. I'm truly sorry."

Encke nodded, numb. "Thank you, sir. I'd like to speak to Commander Keeler for a minute, if I could."

Bering left, with a paternal hand on Keeler's shoulder. It took Keeler a few minutes to get his semi-hysterical weeping under control, a few minutes for Encke to press the call button and ask for Dr Patel.

"I got any options, sir?" Encke asked, clasping Keeler's hand tightly, and feeling the bones in his hand squeeze when Keeler clung back.

The no-nonsense CMO answered without hesitation. "We began treatments to clone a new limb the day after surgery," Patel said, looking as old and tired as Encke had ever seen him. "However, the amount of radiation in your tissues has presented difficulties."

Too long out there in naked space, the_ Scythe_ crushed like a tin can and Callisto gone, sacrificed so that the man seated behind him could live. Only the emergency shields between Encke and the radiation saturated black, the ruined ship trying to envelop its lone life sign in a tight fist of protection for the few precious moments it took to drag him back to the _Sleipnir_. Encke didn't ask if the crushed pulp of his left leg was still imbedded in the ship.

"A bioimplant can be used as a last resort," Patel was saying, pulling Encke back to the present. "We are still pursuing the cloned limb option, however. Apheresis treatments can start in another twenty-four hours, and we can isolate the radioactive particulates in your blood stream-,"

"How soon could I get the implant?" Encke cut him off.

Patel sighed, rubbing his eyes. "As early as twenty-four hours from now, Commander. We only need a few hours to clone enough skin and connective tissue to cover the implant, but there will be a lengthy surgery to graft the limb. You must still recover from your initial surgery first."

Keeler was looking worriedly from Patel to Encke, and Encke asked, "But-?"

"Once you have had the bioimplant placed, it will not be able to be removed, so complete is the integration. You would not be able to have a cloned limb placed should you wish to do so in the future. There will also be a period of physical therapy required, for your brain to learn to ambulate with the artificial limb."

Encke opened his mouth to answer, but Keeler spoke first. "Sweetheart, it's a big decision," he said anxiously. "We should talk about it first. I-I don't want you to rush into anything you'll regret later."

Encke smiled sadly at his lover, raising his other hand to brush a lock of white-blond hair behind Keeler's ear. "Baby, I've come full circle in this damn war. I started it in one of these beds, and I'll be goddamned if I end it in one."

He turned back to the waiting Patel. "Get me consent to sign, and let's get this mess started. How soon can I walk outta here once you sew me back up?"

Patel gave a tired smile. "Three weeks. But if I know you, it will be one."

"Damn right it will. I got a wedding to go to."


	13. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

* * *

Juno appears first in _The Next Twenty -four_ and died in _Cold and Lonely in the_ _Night_

American readers will recognize Abel's family name

Gregori Ruzinsky appears in Simple Things by tjinstlouismo

* * *

Isis lifted her head, her watchful eyes piercing the darkness to stare at the silent intruder. She rose fluidly from the bed and dropped lightly to the floor, padding across the Persian rug to rub her face against Callisto's legs.

"Good girl," he murmured to her in Arabic, scratching behind her ears until she was satisfied no threat would come to her mistress.

Osiris lifted his lazy head and grunted, stretched out the floor at the foot of the great, canopy bed. With a low rumble from her throat, Isis coaxed her sleeping mate to his feet, and together, they loped slowly from the room

* * *

Naomi was asleep, her brow furrowed in restless dreams. Beside her, the tablet with the message from Commander Keeler lay glowing with soft, blue light.

Callisto sat beside his beloved wife, hand gently stroking her long, ebony-silk fall of hair.

"I'm sorry, my love," he apologized sadly. "I never meant to leave you this way."

He looked up, at the silent, shadowed figure standing in the doorway of their bedroom, in the old house back in Cairo. "Why?" he asked bitterly. "I promised her I'd come back. Why did I have to leave her so soon?"

In answer, the figure moved forward and Callisto bent his head in bitter supplication, feeling a warm hand rest against his hair. He closed his eyes, and waited for the pages of his life to turn within his mind.

_A young boy runs across a sunlit lawn, laughing, and is swept up in his father's arms. He weeps at his grave, and the grave of his mother and brother, frightened and alone. His heart turns to stone, as he is rejected, by family after family, until a tall man takes him home in the night. Standing with his proud fathers, he is graduated a physician, top of his class. Smiling tiredly, he returns in the night to his own son, the heart of the young woman he operated on beating fast and strong. _

The images faded; the pages of the book closing, and Callisto looked up, disappointment keen.

"That was not my life," he said.

"That was the life of the child you saved tonight," the figure told him. "You died, so that she might live."

Shaking his head, Callisto felt his anger rise. "This makes no sense—"

He stopped, gasping in shock, as a familiar face smiled back at him.

"Juno," he breathed, bewildered. "What-?"

"Hey, Cal," his young Fighter greeted him, stepping forward out of the shadows. He was beautiful and whole, the ugly scar that marred his handsome face in life, mercifully gone.

"There's this little kid, on Colony 6 right now," Juno explained, settling across the bed from Callisto, Naomi sleeping unknowingly between them. "His name is Miles. He just lost his whole family in the attack, and it will be a long, long time before he gets one to call his own again."

Callisto nodded. "Encke, and Keeler," he said, remembering the two, proud fathers flanking the young medical student.

Juno beamed at him. "Right, dude. They're going to adopt him, in just a couple of years; save him from the streets, and probably an early death."

His fine brows drew together, and Callisto asked," But…_'so that she might live'_? I died in Keeler's place, so he and Encke can adopt a boy who will operate on that young woman?"

It was noble, and had Callisto been a religious man, it might have meant something more.

Juno was quiet a moment, and then he grinned. "Not just any young woman, Cal. Her name is Sarah. She's your daughter."

"But I don't have a-," his hand flew to his mouth in shock, and tears sprang to his eyes as he stared at his sleeping wife. Remembering, the leave they shared, just a month ago…

"Oh; oh, my god…." He laid his hand in wonder atop her belly, still flat and smooth, and a quickened pulse thrummed beneath his fingers.

Tears flowed unchecked down his face, as Juno went on, "There will be an accident, when she's seventeen. She'll need an operation, and a young surgeon will save her life."

Juno laid a hand upon Callisto's shoulder as he wept. "That surgeon would never exist, if Keeler and Encke had died, instead of you."

Callisto wiped his eyes, overwhelmed with conflicting emotions. Pride, sorrow, hope—"Will I know her?"

"Sure, dude," Juno promised him. "We're gonna watch over our daughters, watch them grow up, together." He smiled, his expression one of sadness and acceptance. "She'll have another father soon. So will my little Emily. I was lucky, to have Amy in my life, even for a short time. You were lucky to have Naomi too. Now, they have to move on, and so do we,"

Callisto looked at Juno, remembering the nervous nineteen year old that was so homesick he cried himself to sleep every night for a month when first they met. "How did you become so wise, Juno?" he whispered, and Juno grinned with a shrug.

"Learned from the best, dude." His smile faded, and he added softly, "Time to say goodbye, friend. Come find me, whenever you're ready."

Callisto stroked his wife's soft hair, gazing at the images from their wedding on the walls in their room. He could see a future where there were new pictures too, Naomi laughing alongside a tall man with kind eyes and a young son of his own. She held a little girl in her arms, all light brown skin and soft, golden curls. Her eyes were a piercing, violet-blue.

"Goodbye, my darling," Callisto smiled through his tears, kissing his wife's brow. "I will hold you in my arms again someday." He stood, looking down at her one last time, and went out to where Juno was waiting.

* * *

Ambassador Daniel Kennedy scanned the rows of seats on the crowded transport in vain, shifting his attaché case to his left hand as he squeezed between the passengers on his way to the rear of the shuttle. He'd have to stand the remainder of the forty-five minute flight but at this point, after a 12 hour day of meetings, he was past caring. The clerk at the spaceport had offered to bump another passenger and though Daniel could have easily used his VIP status to do so, he had declined.

Three days on Colony 6, as a member of the Peace Treaty Negotiations team, had changed his perspective on a lot of things.

His work had taken him to the Colonies perhaps twice a year, to conferences at the luxurious Hilton Plaza on Colony 7, or shuttle flights over the ghettos of Colony 5. Colonials were of a type, he had always known, dark in hue and action; nowhere near as refined or educated as the people of Earth. When Colony 6 had been mercilessly attacked the Government of the Earth-Mars Alliance had expected the worst: riots, looting, and vandalism unchecked.

Daniel's team had been tasked with instituting Martial law to keep the peace amongst the colonists, and had quickly found themselves out of a job.

Shop keepers had opened their doors to provide water and food to relief workers, houses of worship had provided shelter for the homeless to sleep. Instead of barring their doors and windows the colonists had opened them to strangers and friends alike, sharing whatever they had until supply ships could arrive. Help came from the other colonies as well, volunteer medical staff for the decimated hospital and police and rescue workers to replace those lost in the destruction.

Daniel and his team had walked the streets and found a traumatized people who had not turned on each other in their hour of need. They had turned _to_ each other, instead.

Nearing the rear of the shuttle, a man about his age stood, a smile on his dark, tired face.

"Please," he said in a voice heavily accented in colonial Russian. He held out his hand to indicate a vacant seat on his left.

"Thank you very much," Daniel smiled gratefully, dropping into the cramped, hard-backed seat with a sigh of relief.

The man nodded and sat again as well. He was perhaps in his late forties but had the lined face and work-gnarled hands that made him look much older. His eyes were a pale grey, his posture strong despite his slight stature. Daniel felt his gaze linger over his own finely cut suit and smooth, manicured hands.

"You are important man," the stranger observed with a half-smile.

Daniel laughed. "Not as important as you, I'd say," and his seat mate laughed softly as well. His clothes identified him as a member of the civil engineering staff.

"_Da_," the man grinned. "I spend the day at the water treatment facility and municipal plants. Very, very lucky that the water supply has not been tainted and no sewage leaks detected. Is much easier to provide bottled water than working toliets for 50,000 peoples."

"And for that, I thank you, sir," Daniel nodded. He held out his hand to the stranger. "Daniel Kennedy," he introduced himself.

The other man shook his hand with a firm, calloused grip. "Gregori Ruzinsky, "

he nodded back.

"Do you live here?" Daniel asked. "On Colony six?"

"Nyet," Gregor replied. He pointed a finger toward the viewport as the shuttle sped over the grey industrial complexes and tenements of colony 5. "I have home and family here. My son Aleks, he is Alliance soldier," he added with pride. "Aboard _Sleipnir_ battle ship. He is war hero."

"Mine too," Daniel said wistfully. The emergency message that had come from Commander Cook just a week ago, informing them of Ethan's injuries had been the worst news in Daniel's life. Seeing Ethan's pale, pained face over the 'Net, lying swathed in bandages in the sterile ships infirmary had been agonizing, but by the grace of God, he was alive.

_Come home,_ Daniel and Julia had pleaded with their son_. You can take a medical discharge now, Ethan. Let us take care of you_ _here._

_I can't,_ Ethan smiled sadly_. I have friends here, who are hurt. I can't leave them. And…I can't leave my Fighter, either_.

The boy seated beside his infirmary bed was beautiful but wary, dark and dangerous. Everything that Daniel feared about the colonies, sitting there with his fingers entwined with those of his only child. When he and Ethan looked at each other, the love between them nearly broke Daniel's heart. His son had left home nearly four years ago a sheltered politicians son, and was now a man. That he could have died, with the last words between them being those of anger made Daniel weep with shame.

_Dad, Mom, this is Cain,_ Ethan had said, his brow furrowed in pain from his recent surgery, his lips dry from drugs and fatigue.

_Thank you_, Julia had cried, fingers trembling toward the screen_. Thank you for_ _protecting our son._

_Yes Ma'am,_ the boy had answered in a low voice accented with colonial Russian, his black eyes and the line across his brow troubled. He swallowed hard, and met Daniel's gaze across the Net fearlessly.

_Do you love my son, Cain?_

_Yes sir, I do._

_And I love him, Dad; Mom. We want… after the war…_

_It's alright Ethan; don't talk now. We'll have all the time in the world to talk soon…._

Ethan's smile had been so beautiful, his face wet with tears. _Alright Dad. I'll be home soon, and you and Mom can meet Cain…and Deimos…._

_Who?_

_I love you both._ Ethan was falling asleep now, Cain brushing the hair out of his eyes as his head lolled on the pillow.

_I love you, darling…_

_Ethan, I love you, son; we'll see you both soon…_

The shuttle banked and pulled into the dock at New Petersburg Station. As it slowed, Gregori tipped his head again and smiled.

"Pleased to meet you, Daniel," he said to, rising from his seat.

Daniel smiled back. "And you , Gregori. I hope you see your son again soon."

He laughed in reply. "Oh _da_! And your boy, may he come home to you soon, too."


	14. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

* * *

We played Blood Brothers when I was a kid. Probably not safe to do that nowadays

* * *

The honeymoon seemed over, and it had barely begun.

Oberon hadn't wasted any time going back on duty, spouting some ridiculous rhetoric about honor and _devoir_, blah blah blah. Puck hadn't been cleared from medical yet, so he smiled sweetly and bade Oberon goodbye with a kiss and watched his tall form all but run out the door, like Puck had some kind of contagious disease.

"Have fun," Puck muttered under his breath, feeling completely sorry for himself. He glanced around the room that had become a sort of prison hatefully, wishing Oberon had just remained on board and they could have had sex all day….

But Oberon had been afraid to do anything more than kiss him, in the week he'd been out of sickbay. They'd never gone a day without some kind of intimacy between them, and Puck was beyond frustrated. Glumly, he wondered if Abel was having the same problems with Cain.

_Abel_. Hmm, as Puck recalled, Abel was on restricted duty too. Probably sitting around just as bored as he was. Puck smiled, and was halfway to the door when he remembered the promise he'd made to Obie the other day about not leaving the room by himself. He rolled his eyes and made his way down the corridor towards 314. Honestly, his hubby could be such a worrywart sometimes—

The door to Abel's cabin opened on the third buzz, a dark clad fighter looking curiously at Puck.

"Hey, Puck," Praxis greeted him with a friendly smile. "What can I do for you?"

Puck stared at him. "I-? Is Abel here?"

"Um, no; he's probably in his own room," Praxis said slowly. He frowned, looking at Puck with concern. "You must've gotten turned around, want me to walk you back up there?"

Voices were drifting up the corridor; Phobos and Deimos were approaching, side by side, talking together. They hadn't seen Puck yet; thank Mother.

"Oh, um, no, Praxis; I'll just go up to deck three." He turned and hurried off before Phobos could spot him.

So, not only had he gotten the wrong room, he'd gotten the wrong _floor_ too. He couldn't even remember taking the lift. Unnerved, he decided Oberon must be right; he wasn't ready to venture out on his own.

But finding his room was proving to be a nightmarish ordeal. He and Oberon were in 322, just across from Baz and Aramis in 323….Or were they in 324? He tried his code several times before he realized that was Kratos' and Zelos' old room….Then 322 should be right next door; but when Sirius answered the door he knew he was wrong again.

"Yo, Puck," the lanky teenage Fighter said, yawning and rubbing a tired hand through his kinky black hair. "You looking for Remus? He's in the nav lab, I think."

"Um, okay," Puck lied, trying not to cry with frustration. "Thanks, Siri', um, I'll go look for him there."

"S'okay," the younger man rubbed his eyes. "Later on, bro."

When the door slid shut behind him, Puck started to shake. He looked at the doors lining the corridor, but all of them looked the same and there were so _many _of them. _Think, you dummy!_ He admonished himself, forcing himself to calm down and focus, but it was so hard. He couldn't seem to remember the sequence of numbers at all now; was it 322 or 232? Maybe it was 223?

With a little sob he pressed his knuckles to his mouth, fighting back tears, and turned around to head in the other direction.

He hurriedly rounded the corner, and walked into a solid wall of black-clad muscle.

"The fuck-?!" Cain snarled, grabbing his arms by reflex when Puck gasped and bounced off his chest. "Watch where you're going, Twinkie!"

"I-I'm sorry!" Puck sobbed. "I've been walking around in circles for _hours_ and I—I-!"

"Let me guess," Cain stated curtly, giving Puck a tap on the head with his finger. "You're lost."

"I just—" Puck started bawling. "I wa-wanted to talk to A-a-abel…!"

Cain shook his head, taking Puck by the arm and steering him in the opposite direction he'd been going. "Uh huh. C'mon, let's get you out of the middle of the road before you run over somebody else."

If he wasn't so relieved he'd have been completely humiliated; Cain being the last person (other than Phobos) he'd want to have a meltdown in front of. But then Cain was punching in his door code, and pushing Puck inside.

"Look, Princess; he followed me home," Cain sang out with his trademark complete lack of tact. "Can we keep him?"

But Puck didn't care, flinging himself in Abel's arms when Abel rose from the makeshift bed on the floor, face creased in sympathy.

"Oh, Puck, don't cry; it'll be alright," Abel said kindly, patting Puck's back.

"No it won't," Cain retorted, flopping down on the mattresses and looking extremely annoyed. "I got an hour off from physical therapy and I came back to screw. Twinkie, you got three choices; join in, watch, or get lost." He was already starting to unbuckle his pants.

"Cain!" Abel hissed, glaring at him. "He's _married_, for God's sake!"

"Sweet! I always wanted to be a home wrecker, hah!"

"I-I just need to find my roooo-om!" Puck gulped on a fresh wail, scrubbing his eyes like a little boy and hating himself for it. "Abel can you please take me back and-and I'll leave you a-alone…?"

"Of course, Puck." Abel put his arm kindly around Puck's shoulders, and led him to the door.

"Bye, Puck!" Cain called happily, kicking off his boots. "Princess; hurry back or I'm gonna start without ya!"

Abel threw a pair of socks at him that bounced off his nose, eliciting a satisfactory squawk.

"Thanks Abel," Puck sniffled, when Abel brought him to his room. Thank Mother he remembered the code to get in, at least. "I'll be okay now. You-you better go back to Cain; it'd be a shame to pass up a perfectly good erection."

"Oh, there's plenty more where that came from," Abel snorted, sounding remarkably like his Fighter.

Puck sat on the edge of his bunk, twisting his ring around his finger and feeling his face heat scarlet with humiliation. Abel sat beside him and waited for him to speak.

"I was going to come talk to you," Puck started.

"What about?"

With haunted eyes, Puck looked into Abel's sweet brown ones. "I don't _remember_," he whispered, frightened. "I can't remember where I put my boots, or what Obie's middle name is….I couldn't find your room, and then I spent like a half an hour trying to find mine. If-if Cain hadn't found me I'd probably still be out there, walking around in circles like the time I got lost in the grocery store when I was four; blubbering like an idiot….."

Abel gave Puck an encouraging smile. "You'll be alright, Puck; you just have to give it time," Abel assured him, patting his knee. "You just had a pretty nasty concussion; it's understandable you'd have some amnesia at first. I'm sure it'll go away."

"But what if it doesn't?" That was the fear that made him lay awake at night, lonely with Oberon sleeping above and not beside him. "If I stay like this, I'll lose my wings. I'll never be able to fly again."

Abel didn't seem to have any pat answers ready for that one. Still, it was so nice to have a friend to talk to, he couldn't bring himself to be bitter about it.

"I was so jealous, when I found out poor Zel had gotten an offer to work for Transplan," Puck said. He looked at Abel quickly. "Don't tell anyone, okay? I felt awful about it, but I couldn't help it. "

Abel smiled, and tucked a lock of his hair behind his ear. "Well, you remember that, at least."

"You should go back," Puck said. "At least _your_ lover isn't afraid to touch you. Obie's just….It's like he's scared of me now. And we just got married! Before, it was like, everyday; sometimes twice a day…."

"Boy, do they put something in their food, or what?" Abel laughed.

As if on cue, there was a bang on the door, and a petulant, "C'mon already, Princess!" sounded from the other side.

Abel blushed, and Puck giggled. "It's open sweetie," he called out, and Cain let himself in.

He glared at the two of them, crossing his arms over his bare, sculpted chest. "Goddammit, I was hoping you two would at least be naked."

Puck looked him up and down; bare chested and barefoot, with his pants hanging open at the top. Mother, he was a beautiful man; too bad he had the personality of Phobos on steroids. And of course, to Puck, he couldn't compare to Oberon.

"Give us a few more minutes, please?" Abel said, annoyed.

Cain looked from face to face, scowling. Puck waved his hand at them both. "Oh, go on, both of you, I'll be okay now. He gave Abel a quick hug of thanks, turned to see Cain leering hopefully with his arms held out. He took Cain's right hand in his, and shook it firmly.

"Thanks for bringing me home, guys!" he said.

As the door slid shut behind them, Cain could be heard faintly asking, '"What; do I stink, or something…?"

* * *

When Encke awoke the morning he was to have surgery, the last person he expected to see in pre op with him was the one sitting up on the bed next to him.

"The hell are you doin' here?" Encke asked. He was understandably nervous; if the implant was rejected, he'd be wearing a prosthesis and walking with a cane the rest of his life.

Phobos glanced up from his tablet, skewering him with his green-eyed glare. "Saving your life. For the second time. You're welcome._ Sir_."

Encke frowned, but Phobos ignored him, eyes glued back to his tablet, sharp-featured face in profile. His high cheekbones were slightly flushed, as though he was running a fever. It was uncanny, with Keeler's hair still short, how much they look alike.

"How-?" Encke started, and Phobos wordlessly raised his left arm before dropping it back to the blanket that covered him. Encke noticed the loose T-shirt Phobos was wearing; sleeve rucked up so that an IV line in the crook of his arm was visible. The tubing was connected to a pheresis unit that hummed as it drained blood from Phobos' body. Encke could see a similar IV line running from the machine to the catheter inserted in his right hand.

He must have made a sound of disbelief, because Phobos huffed, hit 'pause' on his tablet with dramatic flair, and turned to him. His eyes were bright, his breathing slightly accelerated and his face and throat flushed.

" "Princess' hogged the rest of the ships' supply of Universal Blood Product, while he was having his broken heart glued back together," Phobos explained, "and since you and I were apparently separated at birth, I was elected to be your pre-op donor."

At Encke's incomprehensible look, he clarified, "We're probably the only two people for a parsec that are AB-, M factor positive."

"Or," he went on excitedly, "maybe I'll steal one of Deimos' switchblades, and we can sneak behind the monkey bars at recess to become _blood brothers_! You know, cut our thumbs and smear them together? Don't tell me you colony brats didn't play that game, too?"

"Naw, us colony brats didn't have anything fancy like knives," Encke deadpanned. "We just used whatever busted beer bottle was layin' around…."

Phobos closed his eyes and rested back on his pillow, giggling. "Oh Mother; when I'm not all shot up with Procrit stimulators and antihistamines, I'm going to hurt you for giving me that disgusting image, Encke."

"You do, and I'ma tell Myshonok you stole his porn," Encke retorted, making Phobos laugh harder, tucking the tablet out of sight under his leg.

"Um, well, this is better than the alternative; going to Callisto's memorial service," Phobos finished breathlessly, wiping at his eyes and trying to get his breathing under control. He turned away from Encke, right hand knuckled in front of his mouth. "The bastard hated my guts anyway…."

A nurse arrived to stop the transfusion, saving Encke from having to respond. It could have been Keeler's memorial service, he thought, not for the first time. Would have been, if Keeler hadn't been sick that day. That bit of guilty relief was just another thing Encke would have to deal with later.

"We'll be taking you to the OR in fifteen minutes, Commander," the nurse said. He removed Phobos' IV line, gave him a carton of juice and a packet of cookies and hurried off.

"I hate lorna doones," Phobos grumbled, swiping at his eyes just as the doors to sickbay swished open and Keeler hurried in, accompanied by Praxis. Both wore their dress uniforms and Encke knew they must have just arrived from the memorial service.

"Thank you, sweetheart," Keeler said to Phobos, hugging him as Praxis helped him down from the cot.

"Oh, no probs. I'll send you both my bill."

"Good luck, sir," Praxis said to Encke with a respectful nod, and Encke nodded back.

"Thanks, Praxis. Phobos," he said, catching the tall navigator's gaze a moment. "Don't forget your tablet, son."

Phobos colored and snatched up the device, shooting Encke an unreadable look, before he let Praxis lead him slowly out of sickbay.

Then it was just the two of them.

"How was the service, baby?" Encke asked quietly as Keeler came to sit beside him on the bed.

"Really….fucking awful," Keeler admitted, strain showing around his eyes. If Encke felt guilty about Callisto's death, Keeler had been devastated by it, knowing it should have been his own. Keeler took a deep breath, and smiled tightly, lacing his fingers with Encke's . "I'll tell you all about it after surgery, okay sweetheart?"

That big unspoken 'if' hung there between them, the one-legged elephant in the room that refused to go away. Keeler bent down and kissed him quickly, soft on the mouth, as the orderlies came to wheel him out.

"I love you," Keeler said, trying hard to smile and failing miserably.

"Love you too, baby," Encke smiled back, "see you in a couple of hours."

* * *

Keeler waited until Encke was out of sight to start crying. "Commander, you're welcome to wait?" Encke's nurse offered kindly, but Keeler waved the grey haired man off.

"I'll just be in the way, and I've got a pile of work to do," he lied, wiping his eyes, embarrassed. In truth Cook had cleared his schedule for the rest of the day; a supposed kindness that meant Keeler would pace his quarters for the next few hours, biting his nails to the quick. "You'll alert me as soon as Commander Encke is out of surgery?"

The nurse smiled. "Of course, sir."

Outside sickbay, Keeler ran in to Praxis, leaning against the corridor, with Phobos leaning against him.

"Hey, want to come watch some porn with us?" Phobos offered with a dopey giggle, waving the pilfered tablet in the air.

Praxis rolled his eyes. "I was thinking cards instead."

Keeler smiled, shoulders sagging in relief. "Lead the way, guys," he said with a grateful smile, helping Praxis steer a wobbly, chattering Phobos down the hall.


	15. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

* * *

_Ta gueule la bouche_! is a rude way to say shut up, literally 'shut your mouth'

* * *

Puck couldn't wait to tell his lover about his awful day, and the sweet way Abel, and even Cain, had rescued him. Oberon would be sympathetic and they'd cuddle, and Puck would offer to give him a massage after his hard day, helping with relief efforts on Colony 6. Then they'd finish up in the shower together, and after that, the bed, and maybe on top of the dresser, too…..

"Ah, you are still awake, _cheri_?" Oberon said when he returned much, much later that evening, walking and moving like an old man. His fatigues were covered in the red soil of Mars and his shoulders were slumped with exhaustion.

"Oh of course, sweetie!" Puck said happily, all but bouncing off the bed to help his husband struggle out of his filthy clothes. "I had a little nap; now, let's get you in the shower, and you can tell me all about your day!"

Oberon had spent the day digging ditches for a new sanitary sewer, the heavy equipment normally used for such tasks useless with the rationing of fuel.

Puck did give him that massage, rubbing the knots out of his shoulders until he was groaning with relief and the whole cabin smelled like almond oil.

"Mmm, how I love your strong little hands, my sweet Puck," Oberon purred. He reached an arm back to squeeze Puck's thigh in gratitude. "Please, tell me about your day."

Puck did.

Oberon was less than pleased.

"I thought we discussed this, before I left," Oberon said, his body tense again under Puck's hands.

"We did, Sweetie, but I was just so damn_ bored_ here, and Abel's quarters are just down the hall."

"And still, you went out," Oberon continued flatly, paying no attention to what Puck had just said; "without my permission, _cheri_?"

Puck's hands stilled, and an icy cold fury settled into his gut. "Oh, you did _not_ just say that to me," he hissed. He scrambled off Oberon's back, glaring at him in disbelief.

Slowly, Oberon rose up, contrite but unsmiling. "You broke your word to me Puck."

"Like hell I did! I never told you I wouldn't leave the room, and who the _hell_ are you to tell me what I can and can't do anyway?!"

"I am your husband, the one you promised to 'love, honor and obey', _non_?"

Puck was shaking. "Sure, Sweetie," he snapped. I'll _'obey'_ you, as soon as you _'love'_ me!"

"I do love you!" Oberon barked, tired and cross. "I carried you from our ship and watched you nearly die before my eyes! I waited on you, every waking hour while you lay in sickbay; what more do you want from me!?"

"I want you to put me _down_ Oberon. Stop _'carrying'_ me, for fuck's sake; I'm not going to drop dead, like Zel-,"

"_Ta gueule la bouche_!" Oberon shouted, face flushed with sudden, cold fury. "Selfish_ brat_, do not _speak_ of the dead this way!"

"I'm not the one who's being selfish," Puck retorted, shooting to his feet and not backing down an inch. He crossed his arms over his thin chest, glaring into his husband's livid face. "You don't give a _damn_ about Zelos, or Colony 6, Oberon; this is just some bullshit excuse to walk out when things get a little too uncomfortable!"

Oberon stood, his tall form shaking with barely controlled rage. He opened his mouth to snap back, but Puck suddenly waved him off with a disgusted huff. "Oh, get the hell out, then! Why don't you go bunk with Cass, go on; take Encke's place, play the hero. You saved me; might as well go save a whole goddamn colony too!"

He narrowed his eyes, and added, "After all, sweetie; that's what turns you on. Isn't it?"

"Shut. Your. _Mouth_," Oberon growled, looming over him, his muscular frame coiled tight with barely restrained rage. "I said this to you the first time we met, _cheri._ Shut up, before you say something that will make _me_ do something, that I will regret."

Puck stared into his husband's furious dark eyes, seeing a man he didn't know. He would have been almost happy to be afraid right now, to be finally getting Oberon to open up at all, instead of bitterly disappointed.

"You going to hit me, sweetie?" Puck asked quietly, when Oberon slowly raised a hand, a shaking finger leveled in his face.

"I told you I would never lay a hand on you, long ago," he said through clenched teeth. "Do not make me break that promise to you, Puck."

"You won't," Puck said sadly, shaking his head. "You've 'carried me' and 'cared for me' since I was injured, but that's it. Are you ever going to_ lay_ your hands on me again, Oberon?"

Anyone else with half a brain in their head, especially someone a foot shorter and 50 kilos lighter, wouldn't face down a snarling tiger, tensed to spring. But Puck had never backed away from anything in his life, and he wasn't going to start now.

"What are you so afraid of, sweetie?" Puck whispered, unsmiling. "Why won't you just tell me why you're so angry, what you're so afraid of? Unless I'm just damaged goods to you, now."

In the horrible, tense silence that followed, Puck decided to play his last card. "I thought you were a Fighter. Why do you have to walk away from this? Why can't you make yourself fight with me?"

Not_ for_ me. That had been going on non-stop since they first became lovers, just under a year ago. Oberon comforting him; protecting him. Carrying him. It had to stop.

Puck waited, watching the surging emotions Oberon had bottled up come boiling to the surface. For several, dreadful moments he thought Oberon might actually strike him, and then the enraged Fighter turned, picked up the first heavy object he could find-Puck's tablet- and hurled it across the room. It bounced off the wall near the head, shattering into a shower of circuitry and glass, and with a snarl of rage, Oberon snatched up his shirt and strode angrily to the doorway of their room.

"You forgot something," Puck said quietly from behind him, and with another curse Oberon spun to face him, long hair flying about his face.

"What?! What did I '_forget'_, Puck?!" And then he froze, staring, at the hand Puck held, stretched out steadily toward him, his wedding ring resting on his palm.

"If you're going to walk out that door like this, don't bother coming back. And you might as well take this with you, before you go," Puck said softly, tears brimming in his eyes. "I won't need it anymore."

He watched his husband stare at him in disbelief, the shirt he held slipping loosely to the floor. Oberon shook, from fear now instead of anger, shaking his head.

"Put it back on your finger, Puck."

"No, Oberon. It's only going back if you put it on for me."

The silence stretched between them, Oberon closing his eyes, as though in pain. "You almost died, in my arms. When I pulled you from the ship….I am your _Fighter._ I am supposed to protect you, keep you safe.'Ow do you think that made me feel, my love?'

Puck shook his head with a sad little laugh. "I don't _know_, sweetie; because you won't _tell_ me."

Oberon opened his eyes and Puck could see that he was crying too. With a jolt of shock, he realized he had never seen his lover cry before.

"I did not think," Oberon cried, heartbroken, "that there was anything you could do, to make me angry with you. "

He walked forward, took the ring from Puck and slipped it on his finger with a trembling hand. Resting his hands hesitantly on Puck's narrow shoulders, as if he was afraid his hands might be slapped away, he gazed miserably into Puck's eyes. "I thought you would die, and I was so angry, so frightened and angry with you."

He took Puck's hands and led him the few steps to the bunk, kneeling on the floor when Puck sat, so that he wasn't towering over him. "You also made a promise to me; that you would never leave me…and yet, you almost did…."

It was one of the hardest things Puck had ever done, sitting silent and letting Oberon haltingly fumble through the only emotion he couldn't bring himself to express against his smaller, younger lover: _anger._

Puck knew Oberon took his physical strength and size very seriously, especially when it came to dealing with Puck. He was a careful, gentle lover almost to the point of restraint, until the day Puck had teased him to the breaking point and Oberon had taken him hard against the wall in their shower. Instead of feeling guilty afterward, Oberon had been pleasantly surprised at Puck's resilience, _carrying_ a laughing, satisfied Puck back to their bed….

Which brought them right back to mess they were currently in.

Face crumpled in misery as he wept, ashamed, Oberon was pleading, "Please; please forgive me; I told myself I would never raise my hand or voice to you and now I have done both; and broken your tablet too, like a _crise de colère."_

Puck wrapped his arms around Oberon and pulled him close, startled when Oberon's arms immediately gripped him like a drowning man."Crease-what?" he asked softly at Oberon's ear, kissing the side of his face.

"Temper-tantrum," Oberon admitted sheepishly. He pulled back and looked at Puck through his long lashes, sniffling. "I am no better than a _tyran_; a bully, _cheri_."

Puck sighed, giving a watery laugh. "Only to yourself, sweetie; you're only beating yourself up. Look, Obie sweetie, if there's going to be a 'you and me' for the long term," Puck started, and Oberon sucked in a sharp breath.

"_Oui,_ please, my sweet angel;" he begged, clasping Puck's hands in desperation. "You are my only love! Please don't ever question that I want to spend my life with you!"

It took all of Puck's willpower not to roll his eyes. "Alright, number one, I'm usually not sweet, and rarely an angel. I may not be a Fighter, but I'm just as much of a man as you are, Oberon." Oberon started to protest, but stopped when Puck placed his hand to his lips. He was rewarded with a kiss, and smiled at his lover to take the sting out of his words.

"I'm not a piece of art, Obie, so stop putting me on a pedestal. I know you went through hell and back when you were with the ground forces, but I was busting my balls here while you were gone, too. I'm tougher than you think I am. You won't break me."

He pulled Oberon's face towards his, and touched their foreheads together. "'Little Firey One', remember? It's gonna take more than a knock on the head to take me out of the game."

He drew a deep breath, pulling back to meet his lover's troubled gaze. "And it's okay to be mad at me, if you think I let you down, of I did something that pisses you off. What's not okay, is you not telling me _why_."

Oberon nodded, chastised. "You are right, as always, my love. I cannot help but want to worship and protect you, my sweet Puck. This is the French way."

Puck leveled him with a stare. "No, Obie; that's just _you._ Jean-Michel wasn't like that at all, and he was French, too."

"_Qui?"_

"Zelos."

Oberon made a face."He was a singularly wicked man; _Mère du Christ_ pray for his soul. But he made Kratos happy."

"Hm. Loud, too."

Oberon smiled, really smiled at that, and Puck felt like the weight of the world had lifted off his shoulders. He pulled Puck into a warm, gentle kiss.

For about ten seconds.

Somehow, they ended up with Oberon sprawled on the floor and Puck on top of him, kissing each other frantically. Two, huge hands slid down to squeeze the globes of Puck's ass, rocking their bodies together.

"Are you certain?" Oberon panted, peeling Puck out of his clothes as fast as he could.

"Mmm yes!" Puck's eyes rolled back in his head as Oberon urged him forward, kissing his way down his slender torso. "Oh, thank Mother! I was so sick of jerking off!"

Oberon stared at him. "Can I watch?"

Puck giggled. "Only if I can go to colony 6 with you tomorrow, too!"


	16. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

* * *

I imagine Abe to look like the Heavy in Team Fortress 2

Marcus is Cassius' 'real' name

* * *

Nearing the end of the story guys, thanks to all who have stuck with it so far! Chapter 16 will be posted tomorrow and the 17 and 18 the last two,will go up the following day.

* * *

Encke wasn't sure what he'd expected, but it wasn't this. The implant looked nearly identical to his real leg, minus the scar he'd gotten from getting stabbed in the thigh in Basic. There were freckles and moles, hair even, and when he ran his hand along the back of his knee it felt ticklish.

His toes wiggled and looked like his same old, size 12-wide foot, right down to the way his toenails all had half-moons at their base. He lay in bed, flexed his foot in all directions, bent his knee up and down and raised and lowered his leg. The limb felt slightly heavier, though, but that could just be from the dressing that wrapped around his thigh.

"Ready?" Abe, his burly nurse asked, and Encke nodded. Together they maneuvered Encke to a seated position at the side of the bed, Abe instructing Encke to dangle for a few minutes so he wouldn't pass out.

"I don't feel like picking your sorry ass up off the floor today, Bud," Abe grinned at him.

Encke grinned back. "Why not, Abe? You been wipin' it all week, haven't you?"

"Yep," Abe said, looping a transfer belt around Encke's waist and motioning over and equally burly orderly named Clancy. The two men got into position on either side of him, grabbed a hold of the belt and Encke, and Abe counted to three. Encke rose, the two men surprisingly gentle for their size. He stood there, wavering slightly and astonished by how weak he felt.

"We're going over to that chair, Bud," Abe told him, and Encke started to panic.

"Wait—that's too far, I ain't gonna make it-!"

They sat him down until the pounding in his heart slowed, and his breath didn't catch in his chest. After a few minutes, they tried again. And again.

After the fifth time, Encke was sobbing, tears of frustration pouring down his face. "Fuck!" he cried, wiping his face angrily while his shirt stuck to him with cold sweat.

"Hey, Clancy; take five, okay?" Abe said quietly. Encke put his head down and shook with humiliation, hearing the door to his sickbay room hiss quietly shut. Abe pulled the chair over and sat in front of him, waiting until he calmed down.

"You done feelin' sorry for yourself?" the older man asked, and if Encke hadn't been as weak as a kitten he'd have punched him in the mouth. Without giving him time to answer, Abe sighed and went on.

"Don't be." Encke looked up at him, and Abe gave him a lopsided grin. "Don't be done. You're twenty-six years old, built like a brick shit house and have a beautiful boyfriend who loves you, though there's no accounting for taste," he shrugged, and Encke sort of smiled.

"Look, don't fall for all the macho BS about how fucking tough you oughta be; you had a piece of your body ripped off and you got every right to cry your eyes out over it."

He reached down and hiked up his pant leg, and Encke was shocked to see his lower right leg was artificial to his knee. "They didn't have such fancy ones back in my day," Abe grinned. "Lost it when I was twenty-two; working in the machine shop at the army barracks back home. Been married to the sweetest little gal about six months when it happened. Dunno why, but she stuck around. We got three grandkids now."

Encke looked away. "I ain't gonna make Keeler do that," he mumbled dejectedly. "He deserves somebody whole, not patched up like a rag doll."

Abe shrugged. "That's up to you two, but I think the kid's as crazy about you as you are about him. You willing to work harder than you ever have, to keep him?"

"Yeah," Encke nodded after a minute, hating himself for being needy enough to subject Keeler to a life saddled with a cripple for a husband. "Yeah Abe, I am."

Abe grinned and slapped his knee, and Encke jumped, surprised to feel it just as if it had been his own flesh and bone.

"And I'm willing to help ya, Encke. There's just one problem." He stood and pushed the chair back across the room, only a meter or so away, though it looked like forever.

"You still gotta get your ass outta that bed, and into this chair."

* * *

Oberon looked forlornly at the notice boards outside the relief center on Colony 6. The thought of spending another backbreaking day with a shovel in his hand made him want to sit down and cry.

"So, where are you guys headed?" Puck asked Porthos and Ethos, excited like a child on a school adventure. Oberon looked at him with pride; whatever it took to make Puck happy, he would do.

"They need people for the daycare center," Ethos suggested.

"Pass," Porthos said, making a face.

"How about crowd control?" Puck suggested, his eyes bright and gleaming. "Ooo, I bet we get to carry guns, and everything!"

Oberon and Porthos exchanged a look over Puck's head.

"Hey, here's one," Ethos said, wandering towards a flashing monitor near the bottom of the list of needs. " 'Kitchen help needed, report to PS 15, 13:00 hours.'"

He turned to Puck and Oberon. "Do either of you two know how to cook?"

* * *

The kitchen was a disaster zone; flour all over the floor, dirty pots and pans piled everywhere. A squat little man in a filthy apron ran up to them with something akin to love in his eyes. He introduced himself as the social studies teacher at the school.

"Oh, thank heaven, help at last!" he smiled wearily, looking the four soldiers over expectantly. "Now, any of you young men know his way around a kitchen?"

Porthos hooked a thumb over his shoulder. "Oberon knows how to cook."

Oberon stiffened and glared at his blond head. "I do not '_cook', cheri._ With food, I _'create.'_ "

"Terrific!" the teacher sad, clapping his hands. "What can you _create_ for a couple hundred people with a freezer full of frozen fish and a dozen bushel bags of shoe string potatoes?"

Porthos frowned in Oberon's direction. "Thought it was supposed to be _bread_ and fish?"

"We are not on a mountain, and I am not _Jésus,_ you heathen."

He drew himself up and looked down at the hapless teacher. "You have ketchup, and_ vinaigre_ _non?"_

"Whole pantry full, fella."

Oberon said a prayer of penance to the saints of fine French Cuisine. "Then I have _diner _for the multitudes. _Cheri,_ you take the mop; Ethos, the sink; and I will take Porthos. To the freezer, my strong friend! We have fish and chips to fry!"

* * *

"Mama, Mama!" Zoe shouted as she and Miles ran across the gym. "There's Alliance soldiers here, they're from the_ Sleipnir_, Daddy's ship! Mr. Anderson said they're working in the kitchen. Me and Miles peeked, one of them even has a _Mohawk_!"

"That's nice, honey," Jaleesa said, blowing a strand of her long curly hair out of her face. She was almost out of diapers and Lakeshia had completely forgotten all of her potty training since the attack. She cried and fussed and wouldn't let Jaleesa change her, until Jaleesa was ready to start crying, too. Zoe's news wasn't anything special; the_ Sleipnir_ had been sending personnel to the colony for over a week, all except for Marcus, who'd been stuck on board taking over the Commander's duties while he was still laid up in sickbay.

At least they'd made contact with each other over the Net. Not a very romantic greeting, though, with a cranky three year old screaming in the back ground.

"Zoe, look!" Miles said excitedly. "I think that's your Dad! It looks like the picture in your tablet!"

Jaleesa barely registered the delighted squeals of the children, waving them off distractedly when they asked if Mariah could come see the soldiers, too.

"C'mon, sweet pea," she crooned to her fussing three year old daughter, standing with her in her arms and swaying back and forth to calm her down. This encouraged the baby in her belly to start dancing too, kicking her smartly in the bladder.

"Can I help you, ma'am?" a male voice asked.

"Sure thing, you can hold this lil' screamer so her mama can run to the john." She turned, and the most beautiful man she had ever seen was standing there, smiling and holding out his arms.

"Well, you sure took your damn time," she smiled radiantly, laying her daughter in her husband's arms. Lakeshia squealed with excitement, snuggling into Marcus' arms. Zoe hung off one leg, Mariah the other and Bonnie barked with delight.

"Where's my sugar?" Cassius grinned, leaning in for a quick kiss, and Jaleesa laughed and pushed him away.

"Back in a minute, honey; 'sugar' gotta go and pee!"

* * *

They ate Oberon's delicious fish and chips in the cafeteria together, a family again at last. Cassius sat with his arm around Jaleesa, feeling his son kicking beneath the palm of his hand. Lord, did it ever feel good to hold a woman again.

"Does he ever stop?" he asked quietly, pulling Jaleesa's shoulder against his side.

"Oh this is nothing. He's just warming up, for when I lay down and try and sleep tonight."

"Oh, I'm sorry, baby," Cassius chuckled against her hair.

"Enough to get a vasectomy? Or a house; I'll take either one, I'm not fussy."

She smiled up at him, her pretty brown face too tired for his liking, but at least she was alive, they were all alive. Cassius kissed her sweetly. He watched Zoe chase her friend Miles around the gym, laughing and playing tag with some of the other orphaned children.

"They look pretty tight," Cassius observed quietly. "They find the poor kid's family yet?"

Jaleesa shook her head. "Honey, they're not going to. I feel so awful for the little guy, he's been with us ever since the first night."

Cassius shrugged. "I got us a housing assignment," he said, quiet so as not to wake Mariah who had fallen asleep on his knee. "There's room for him too."

* * *

But Miles couldn't be persuaded.

"Please?" Zoe pleaded, tugging on his hand. The child care workers were calling the orphaned children to the transport that would take them to a safe house, to wait until their parent's fates could be discovered.

"I can't, Zoe," Miles said, shaking his head with the determination only a child has. "I have to be where Mom and Dad and Julian can find me, when they—when they come back."

Cassius held Zoe to him while she cried, watching the sad little boy leave behind the only chance for a family he'd have, for a very, very long time.


	17. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

* * *

Planning for the Future, Dealing with the past

Last two chapters tomorrow and this will be DONE ! I think you will like them both : )

* * *

Porthos had never done manual labor in his life until the military, and then precious little of it, as a Navigator. Yet when volunteers were needed to help offload cargo from the supply ship he'd been the first in line, lugging packing crates and shelving the myriad numbers of goods needed to help with the relief efforts on Colony 6. Porthos had been restless and in need of burning off some pent up energy, and was surprised at how good the hard work made him feel.

The_ Sleipnir_ had gone from being a vast, powerful battleship to a sort of warehouse in space, a repository for food and medical supplies and all manner of building materials.

Some of it was less than legal.

"_Sweet!_" Vicks crowed, maneuvering a heavy crate off the hi-lo and onto a wheeled sled. "Been _waiting_ for this baby to get here!"

Porthos looked up from his task of unpacking a box of diapers and baby food, the fake powdery baby smell making him faintly nauseous.

Vicks cracked open the top of the crate with a crowbar. His bright green eyes lit up with glee as he surveyed the contents with a whistle of delight. He looked up at Porthos and grinned mischievously.

"What'd you get, Vicks; a sexbot in a box?" Porthos smirked.

"Better," he said knowingly. "Check it out."

Porthos hopped down off the stepladder and wandered over to peer inside the crate.

"Whoa!" he laughed. "Been a long time since I've seen any of_ that_!" He looked at Vicks eagerly.

"You selling?"

"Yup. And you get the honor of first dibs, my friend."

* * *

Ethos was sitting up in bed back in Porthos' cabin, his curly hair a bed-rumpled riot atop his head. The sheet draped his lap while he sat frowning at his tablet, his chest bare. Porthos wondered if the rest of him was still bare too, and decided it was a very good look on his new boyfriend.

"You look a lot crabbier than when I left this morning," Porthos commented dryly. It would figure that as soon as he found someone he wanted to spend time with they'd be stuck on opposite duty shifts.

Ethos made a face. "I've been reading my mail. Grandma Rose asking for the fifth time when I'm coming home; a rejection from Aerodynamics; and acceptance letters from the U of M, the Hawking Institute, and MIT."

Porthos shrugged out of his sweaty coveralls and pitched them into the decontamination chute. "Aerodynamics? I thought you were staying in the service?"

Ethos shrugged and wouldn't meet his eyes. "I thought I was too…I sort of wanted to see what my other options might be." He let the unspoken; in _case we stay_ _together, _remain unspoken.

Porthos studied his bent head, watching him rub his left wrist absently. He padded over to the bunk and Ethos scooted back to make room for him. "I have something that'll make you feel better," he offered flopping down with a contented grunt.

Without looking up Ethos raised an eyebrow, still studying his tablet. "Then why are you still dressed?" he asked.

Porthos laughed, digging into the pocket of his fatigues and pulling out his purchase from Vicks' stash.

Ethos' eyes grew wide. "Where'd you get _chocolate_?" he breathed, staring at the king sized Hershey's with Almonds bar in Porthos' hand.

"Vicks," Porthos said casually. He peeled back the wrapper and oh, man; the scent of the chocolate alone was like a meal in itself. He broke off a piece and popped it in his mouth, eyes closed in bliss. "The little fucker got a whole case of candy in this morning, everything from Smarties to Reese's to Three Musketeer's bars."

He broke off another piece and ate it contentedly. "Probably sold it all by now. Bet old Vicks' made enough cash during this tour to buy his own _moon_."

Ethos wasn't listening. "Don't I get some?" he asked, watching Porthos make short work of the candy bar in dismay.

"I seem to recall you 'getting some' this morning."

"Porthos!"

Chuckling, Porthos rooted around in his pocket and pulled out an equally large bar of Cookies 'n Crème. He tossed it in Ethos' lap. "Will this do?"

"Oh yes; thanks, honey!"

Porthos watched with a smile as Ethos tore open the wrapper with the delight and total lack of restraint of a little kid. Which at twenty-two, he sort of still was.

"Mmmm," Ethos murmured happily. Porthos decided that smile wouldn't be a bad thing to come home to every night.

"So which one do you like best? Of the schools?" he clarified at Ethos' puzzled look.

Again that bashful shrug. Damn, he was adorable. "Oh, they're all very nice," Ethos said quietly.

Porthos propped his head in his hand and decided to be nice too for a change. "I'll go wherever you want, Ethos," he said softly. "If you want me to."

This time he was the one letting the _in case we stay together_ hang unspoken in the air. He was surprised at how nervous he suddenly felt.

Ethos smiled. "Right now, I want you to see if Vicks has any more candy bars, and when you get back, we can figure out where we're going to live."

* * *

"You know, I'll have my twenty-five ears in at the end of this tour," Bering said as they enjoyed a rare dinner together in the officer's lounge. "I'm thinking about retiring."

Cook looked over the rims of his glasses at him blandly, and then continued cutting his steak. "Well it's not like I've never heard _that_ before," he said mildly.

Bering frowned, gesturing with his salad fork. "I'm serious, Elias."

"Pass the salt if you would, please?"

When Bering didn't answer Cook reached for the shaker himself but his lover calmly pulled it out of his reach. "Not until you listen to me."

Cook laid his knife and fork alongside his plate. "Niels. This is the first time I've sat down at something other than a desk or a toilet in nearly a week. It's also the first time we've eaten together in Mother knows how long—"

"We could eat together every night," Bering suggested with a smile, and Cook would have had to be a stronger man, to admit he wasn't tempted to believe him.

Bering relinquished the salt and Cook seasoned his baked potato, frowning.

"You've earned this appointment, Elias," Bering said quietly. "Annapolis hasn't had a decent Commandant in over fifteen years. If I retire and you accept the promotion, we can finally go back to Earth. Get a little place on the Bay, go sailing in the summertime."

"Wouldn't you be bored?" Cook asked.

Bering took a sip of his coffee and grinned. "Are you kidding me? I'm going to set up a studio and start painting again; enjoy seeing my daughters and wait impatiently for a grandchild."

"Hm. We would be rather close to your ex, wouldn't we?…and if you recall, dear, the bitch hates me."

"Oh, she hates everyone," Bering scoffed. "Stop thinking you're special, darling."

Cook looked across the table into his lover's dark eyes. "Are you sure, Niels? You've been in space for almost all of these twenty-five years. Are you really ready to stop now?"

"Really sure. Really ready."

"Well alright, dear. But only if we can name our sailboat _The Sleipnir_."

* * *

"….Just can't _believe_ he'd let a stud like _Aramis_ slip through his fingers; honestly, Baz has to be the most _closeted_ guy I've ever met! I mean, he looked positively _miserable_ when I said goodbye to him before he got on the transport this morning," Phobos said happily, folding his uniforms and stuffing them in his dresser drawer. "I heard Aramis spent the rest of the day getting _drunk_ with …."

"Mmm hmm," Deimos nodded at regular intervals throughout his Navigator's recitation of today's gossip. Nearly three years with the nosy little blond had taught him exactly how and how not to act while Phobos was talking. Which was always.

Deimos was preoccupied with his own laundry at the moment, sorting through socks and underwear until he felt the mattress dip and realized Phobos had come to sit next to him. He had also stopped talking.

"Put those down for a minute," Phobos said, taking Deimos' hands in his. He scooted closer and fixed Deimos with his big green eyes. "I-I'm really going to miss you, Deimos," he said, sniffling a bit. "You're the only man in my life so far who's stuck around longer than a year. "

His lip wobbled and Deimos pulled him into a hug. "I'll miss you too, мое солнышко (my little sunshine)," Deimos said against his hair. Phobos squeezed him back with a little sob, making his eyes pop a bit. With effort Deimos extricated himself before Phobos broke one of his ribs.

Phobos smiled sadly and Deimos gently wiped the tears from his pretty face. "Do you think we should have a good-bye fuck?"

"Probably not, angel."

"Yeah, you're probably right."

* * *

Keeler was exhausted. He'd spent most of the day conducting exit evaluations with the Navigators who were still on board.A dozen or so had departed the ship already and the week had been filled with farewells and tears.

After that he'd grabbed dinner from the mess to go eat with Encke.

"Baby," he'd told Keeler forlornly, holding his hand in his sickbay room. "I'm not gonna hold you to anything. It's not fair to you to stick you with an invalid the rest of your life."

He'd looked so lonely and scared, it had broken Keeler's heart. Every other wounded member of the squadron had been healed and departed sickbay long ago.

"Sorry; not getting rid of me that easy, sweetheart," Keeler had silenced him with a kiss.

It was long after lights out now and still Keeler couldn't sleep; couldn't understand exactly how he'd managed to find himself in the hangar bay, either. He wandered the cavernous deck looking at the parked ships; vessels that would hopefully never have to be used in battle again. The_ Reliant_ and its state of the art prototype engine were long gone; lying dissected in some salvage yard probably. The _Scythe _had been destroyed, by a single shot from the _Sleipnir_ the day of Callisto's memorial service. She'd become a tomb, and so would not be sold for scrap.

She could have been Abel's tomb, Keeler shuddered.

She _should_ have been his.

If Keeler never flew again, he'd be a happy man.

The_ Tiberius_ was still here, along with the _Veyron_ and _Da Vinci_. Keeler had heard that Oberon and Puck had come to bid a tearful goodbye to their ship. There was a rumor Puck had climbed the ladder and pried off the name plate from the Navigator's console, but it was only a rumor.

As he walked slowly around the great ships he heard voices coming from the direction of the _Tiberius._ He followed the sound until the voices stopped and then Abel was calling to him.

"Keeler! Up here, come on; climb up and sit with us."

Praxis, Cain and Abel were all seated on the great ship's wing. Cain's cigarette smoke drifted lazily towards the vents, and a bottle of something dark stood near Praxis' boot.

"God I hope that's booze," Keeler said, holding out his hand after he'd settled across from Abel.

Praxis handed him the bottle with a shrug. "Maybe you can tell us. None of us are drunk yet, but it tastes bad enough."

Keeler took a fortifying sip, and grimaced. "Ugh. It tastes like cough syrup."

He noticed Abel had relaxed back into Cain's side. Abel held his hand out, swallowed with an ungraceful hiccup and then Cain took a turn. The mystery bottle then made its way back to Praxis again.

"How's Encke?" Cain asked quietly. He ground his cigarette out on the burnished metal and pitched it over onto the deck.

"Scared," Keeler answered honestly. "Bored shitless. Wondering how much longer he'll have to stay in sickbay."

He dragged a hand through his untidy hair and sighed in frustration. "I wanted to stay with him tonight, but he kicked me out."

"Yeah, well he was right; you look like shit," Cain observed. He took the bottle back from Praxis and took a swig. "So why aren't you back in your quarters asleep?" He asked pointedly, gesturing with the bottle.

Keeler made a face at him, taking the bottle and taking a drink before passing it to Abel. It was starting to spread a welcome warmth through his weary bones, a sort of despondent apathy following close behind.

"Can't sleep," Keeler shrugged. "Besides, I heard there was this party going on in the hangar deck, and I thought I'd crash it."

Abel laughed softly. As the level of the bottle dropped so had his position, his head now almost in Cain's lap. He was drunk enough to not register that Cain and Praxis were discretely looking away from a mortified Keeler.

"Goddammit I can't believe I just said that," Keeler groaned.

" 'S'okay," Praxis grinned. "Cain just said he was too hot a minute ago."

"No, that was just so he had an excuse to take off his jacket and show off his sexy arms," Abel slurred. He reached a hand up to pet Cain's face.

"Want us to go so you two can make out?" Keeler offered.

"Naw, we already fucked in the _Re-"_ Cain leaned back, laughing as Abel swore and swatted at him.

Praxis rolled his eye. "Everybody has sex in their ship at some point, dumbass."

The three of them looked expectantly at Keeler as he remained silent. He grinned. "What, you think officers aren't as depraved as you plebes?"

They all laughed and then the bottle was passed around one more time. Keeler got the last swallow.

"Oh, we forgot to tell you, last drink's gotta streak across the deck naked," Cain grinned.

"Race you," Keeler challenged dryly.

"Oh God don't encourage him," Praxis moaned. Cain flipped him off while Abel snored quietly in his lap.

The three of them lapsed into an uncomfortable silence, until Keeler said quietly, "C'mon guys, you know why I'm here. Are you two going to make me ask?"

"I, uh figured Phobos would've told you everything by now," Praxis said uneasily. Cain fidgeted and looked away.

Keeler shrugged. "Most of it." Except the part he was terrified to know. The part he_ had_ to know.

Praxis cleared his throat and looked at Cain, who was looking away, jaw tense.

"Please Cain," Keeler begged softly.

"What do you want me to tell you, baby?" Cain replied, still looking away. "The shit ignited and Callisto turned right into the fuckin' blast of it. Probably dead in half a heartbeat—"

"Jesus, Cain," Praxis said in disgust. "Have some mercy."

Cain glared back at both of them. "That's not what you want though, is it, Keeler? You ain't exactly giving yourself any mercy. Yeah Cal's dead; yeah he was piloting your ship when you were sick. Yeah he's dead, and you're alive."

He stopped, shaking his head. "End of story, baby. It's over, and done. You can't change it any more than I can, or Praxis, or Myshonok or Oberon or even Encke. We were all there too, so you don't exactly get to hog all the guilt for yourself."

Keeler squeezed his eyes shut and fought to keep himself together, and failed.

"Cyclops; gimmie a hand for Chrissakes," Cain muttered and Keeler heard the shifting of bodies and Abel complained sleepily "Don' wanna get up yet…"

Strong arms went around him and Keeler pressed his face to Cain's dark hair, sobbing.

"Get it all out, baby," Cain whispered a kiss against his ear. " S'okay; I owe you one."


	18. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

* * *

Cureus is SC's character from Someone Else's Problems

Two of my favorite Anime characters get a cameo mention here

* * *

In the end Dr. Patel was right, and Encke stayed in the infirmary three long weeks learning to walk with his new leg. Everyone helped him pass the time, for which he would always be grateful. A group of his Fighters loped in all together one night—Cain, Deimos, Oberon, Praxis and a lonely looking Aramis—bringing pizza and beer, (he didn't ask from where) and a small hoop and basketball. They mounted the hoop with suction cups near the ceiling across from Encke's bed and played endless rounds of HORSE. Deimos, the shortest of them all, won nine times out of ten.

Abel and Phobos visited together sharing gossip with him, Phobos claiming he wanted to make sure his precious blood was 'going to good use'. Porthos stopped in with Ethos and Puck in tow. It was obvious there was something going on between Porthos and Ethos, though Encke doubted they were in a 'Dom/sub relationship', as Phobos put it. After they left Puck stayed for over an hour, he and Encke talking about their ruined dreams and hopes for the future.

He sent a long letter to his Aunt, and then to Callisto's wife. It was a catharsis of a sort, when Naomi arranged to speak with him, the last person to be with her husband before he died. She cried with him and thanked him but Encke honestly never understood why.

The best part of the day came when Keeler visited, which he did every day without fail.

* * *

Encke was sitting in the chair when Keeler came to see him after his duty shift was over. He looked more happy than tired for a change.

"Look at you!" Keeler said in delight, crossing the room and bending to give Encke a kiss.

Encke snagged him in his arms and pulled him down onto his lap. "You can do better'n that, can'tcha baby?" he purred against Keeler's throat, mouthing his ear.

Keeler cast a quick glance at the door. "Well, I suppose I can."

And he did.

Encke wound his arms around Keeler's strong, pliant body, running his hands through his hair and caressing his waist. Damn, he felt good; little extra muscle here and there, ass a little less bony. Must have been on some good pasture lately.

They pulled apart, Keeler's eyes glazed and expression horny.

"Encke…" Keeler panted as Encke's restless hands felt him up like they were two teenagers parking on a date. It'd been way too long since he'd had a handful of anything this nice.

"Yeah, Baby?" Encke growled against Keeler's throat.

"Mmm, oh; Encke, you really…."

"Tell me baby, and I'll fuck you right here-,"

"….Stink." Keeler turned his head and grimaced at Encke's arms, raised high and open to the breeze. "When's the last time you had a shower, anyway?"

"How long I been in here?"

"Almost three weeks, sweetheart." He rubbed his ass against Encke's lap for emphasis. "A really lousy, LONG three weeks."

Encke raised an eyebrow. "I ain't exactly been at the spa, you know," he said flatly.

Keeler's eyes suddenly lit up. He swiveled his head in the direction of the shower room just across the hall; then hopped off Encke's lap to take a closer look at the chair he was sitting in. It was the wheel chair he'd come back from physical therapy in. That had been a bitch of a session; Abe musta had a streak of Doberman in him.

"Baby, what are you doin'?!" Encke hissed as Keeler circled behind him and, unlocking the wheels, took the handles in his hands. "Hey!" Encke yelped, suddenly in motion. "Where the hell you think you're takin' me?!"

Keeler glanced down and grinned at him, pushing him resolutely to the shower.

"To the spa!" he winked.

* * *

"This is a really stupid idea,"Encke complained for the third time as Keeler grunted and struggled to maneuver the chair into the handicapped access shower stall. "You ain't no nurse," he said, when Keeler started stripping him.

"Oh, look how good you can stand now, sweetheart!" Keeler said delightedly as Encke levered himself up (Keeler forgot to lock the wheels again the first time which was almost a disaster). He busied himself with yanking down Encke's pants and doing an excellent job of ignoring Encke's nervous complaints.

"I think you oughta go get Clancy."

Keeler smiled, laying his hands on Encke's shoulders and pushing him back down in the chair. He snuck back across the hall leaving Encke bare assed naked with his hands over his lap, swearing under his breath. Peering around the door Encke could see Keeler busily rooting around in his cabinet drawers, sneaking back a moment later with a pile of towels and toiletries in his hands

"Here, hold this a minute, okay?" Keeler said, dumping a pile of towels in Encke's lap. He busied himself with hanging Encke's sweat pants and t-shirt on the wall, humming happily while completely ignoring Encke's protests.

"Baby," Encke said, "not that I don't appreciate it and all—"

"Sweetheart, you're getting a bath whether you like it or not."

"—But if I slip and fall in here, you can't catch me—"

"You're not going to fall." Keeler _tsked,_ starting the water and testing the various settings on the hand held sprayer. "Ooo; pulsating massager; that could be fun."

"You're gonna get all wet," Encke tried again. "Please, Baby, go get Abe or Clancy. 'Least they've already washed my smelly ass."

He mumbled the last part, feeling his face heat and knowing it had nothing to do with the steam building up in the room.

Keeler set the sprayer back in its holder and came around to stand in front of him. He squatted down so that they were at eye level, Encke looking at him unhappily.

"Encke," Keeler began patiently. "I'm not going to do this all by myself."

With a sigh Encke felt his shoulders sag in relief. Until Keeler added, "_You're_ going to help me. We're going to do this together. From here on, we do everything together."

He kissed Encke softly. "Besides; there isn't any part of you I haven't already seen, smelly or not."

_I can't believe I got this lucky sometimes either,_ Encke thought. And it'd been so long since he'd seen a real smile on Keeler's face…. There wasn't any use arguing once Keeler had that fanatical gleam in his eye, but Encke tried one last time.

"You're gonna get all wet."

"No I'm not," Keeler grinned. He stood and began taking off his clothes too. "I'm gonna get all _naked_."

* * *

Abel and Cain were both still on restricted duty, lounging idly in their quarters one evening waiting for Deimos to return from his shift. Preparations for the ship being decommissioned were underway, and gossip ranged from her being stripped for parts, to being sold to a wealthy business tycoon as a private yacht.

"You've got to be shitting me?" Cain snorted, clad only in shorts and sprawled across the mattress, his head in Abel's lap. Jet black hair spilled across Abel's thighs, shiny and clean.

Cain had made a rare visit to the ship's barber, Cureus, and gotten his choppy locks somewhat tamed recently. Abel thought it made him look older, and deliciously sexy, though Cain had protested loudly at that, claiming he'd been sexy in the first place. He didn't protest all the fussing and finger-combing he'd been getting lately, though, half asleep and practically purring while he was petted by Abel's fingers, carding through his hair.

"Some bozo really wants to buy this tub?" Cain went on in disbelief. "I figured they'd be dismantling her and selling her to that Sweeper Dude that runs a junk yard with that little German Babe…?"

"Oh, you mean Duo and Hilde? Yeah, I remember meeting them on Starbase 5 when we all went on leave; they're a really cute couple. Friends of Vicks, weren't they?"

Cain chuckled, reaching up to tweak Abel's left nipple, making him squeak. "Was that before or after you got your titty ring, hm?'

Abel squirmed, laughing and knocking Cain's hand away. "Stop it you brat! Anyway, if the Alliance is going to strip the_ Sleipnir_ for parts, I heard they'll be used to help rebuild all the damage that was done to the colonies."

Cain sighed, closing his eyes and turning his face into Abel's thigh. "Mmm, s'nice. Little more to the left, Baby."

"I think you must have been a cat in another life, Cain," Abel chuckled.

They both looked up when the door quietly opened and Deimos came in.

"Hey, did you get a haircut too, Deimos?" Abel smiled up at him as he shucked out of his duty jacket and boots. "I like it; I can see your pretty eyes better."

Deimos blushed and gave a pleased little smile.

"Ooo; I know; let's all go get end-of –war makeovers-!" Cain sing-songed in a falsetto voice, until Abel shut him up with a hand over his mouth. Cain laughed, licking Abel's palm rapidly until Abel made a disgusted noise and yanked his hand free.

Deimos sat cross legged by Abel's side, warm hand on Abel's knee. "Want me to go ask Porthos for his ball gag?" he asked helpfully as Abel swore and wiped his hand on Cain's pillow.

"Ick, no; that's probably between Mop-Top's jaws by now," Cain shuddered. Deimos used the moment Cain's eyes were closed in disgust to lean over and give Abel a quick kiss.

"I think it's sweet Porthos and Ethos are together," Abel said.

"Princess, you think Cook and Bering are sweet together too, gag me with a spoon…."

Abel ignored him, lifting his hand to run his fingers through Deimos' hair. "This looks really good, love. It seems like Praxis got his cut too, now that I think about it."

Deimos and Cain exchanged a quiet look.

"We all sort of agreed, until Keeler's hair grows out the rest of the way, none of ours would be longer," Deimos explained.

"Yeah; still kinda flips me out, when I see him," Cain said ruefully. "Damn was it short when he come aboard the Excelsior. Fuckin' hot as_ hell_!"

"Hm," Abel said with a sad little smile. "Encke kept his braid….God, was that sad."

No one said anything for a few minutes, and then Deimos shook his head. "He's got another day or two before he gets released from sickbay," he informed them. "I stopped in to see him before I came here….he's a lot stronger, but still not walking very well."

"Damn," Cain muttered, and Abel could see his face looked troubled. For all their bickering over the years, he knew Cain and Encke were close; probably had some kind of past from when they were all in Basic Training together.

Deimos rested his weight against Abel's side, cuddling with a soft sigh. For a few minutes, they talked about the supply ship that had come in full of snacks and data chips of the latest girly magazines, and packages from home. Everyone was getting ready for the war to end, to finally breathe and start a new life.

Except for Encke, crippled and struggling to walk again with an artificial limb. Abel remembered just a few weeks before, Encke pulling him anxiously aside to look through some online jewelry catalogs, and help him pick out a ring for Keeler. That had probably come in on the supply ship today, too.

"What do you guys want to do when we go home?" Abel asked them suddenly.

"Sleep, eat, get drunk and fuck," Cain answered without hesitation.

"You do that here,_ Lubovnik_," Deimos pointed out.

"Yeah, but just with you two—"

"I'd like to go back to school," Deimos said softly. "I'd like to study pharmacology."

"I want to get married," Abel said suddenly. There was a ringing silence; Abel not quite sure he'd said it aloud himself.

"I want to get married," he repeated slowly after a moment. "To both of you."

They were both staring at him with unreadable looks, Cain slowly sitting up, his black eyes boring into Abel's brown ones.

"No," he said flatly, the same moment Deimos said, "Yes."

"It'll never work," Cain warned. "We got a good thing going now; why screw it up with a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo-?"

"I think it's a great idea," Deimos smiled from ear to ear. Abel smiled happily back at him, and then they both turned to smile hopefully at Cain.

His dark eyes jumped from face to face. "Uh uh, nope, nadda, _no can do_!" he snarled, making a dismissive cutting motion with his hands. "Tell you what, _you _two get married, I'll be the 'other man' for both of you."

"But we _have_ to be married," Abel reasoned, "for the children's sake."

Cain's hair nearly stood on end. "WHAT?! No kids! No way in hell, not in a million years, _no, nyet, ne, nein, non_….!"

Abel turned in Deimos' arms and kissed him suddenly, moaning. Deimos seemed pleasantly surprised at first but then joined in happily. They broke apart once they realized Cain had shut up, Abel sighing against Deimos' lips.

"I suppose he'll just have to miss the honeymoon sex surprise we had planned," Abel sighed.

Deimos, who had no idea what Abel was talking about (as there was no surprise currently, but Abel would be sure to have a chat with Phobos for some ideas), sighed back.

"I suppose you're right, _milaya moya_. It will be fun for just the two of us, though."

"Mmm." He turned to Cain, Deimos pressing little kisses along his neck that made him shiver.

Cain's jaw was loose, his eyes slightly glazed. "We'll send you pictures," Abel promised sweetly.

"And videos," Deimos added helpfully. "With sound."

Cain glared at them. "So, this is how it's gonna be, huh? I spend the last three years of my life getting shot at by aliens and screamed at by lieutenants, only to have you two little bastards try to manipulate me with sex? You think I'm gonna fall for that, Princess? Myshonok, you of all people oughta know me better than that!" Abel bit his lip, he and Deimos waiting for the inevitable—

Cain pounced, pinning them down effortlessly and grinning wolfishly at both of them.

"Okay, you little brats, but I'm warning you: NO kids, NO dogs, and we're taking MY name!"

He leaned closer, Abel feeling Deimos shiver beside him at the feral look In Cain's eye. It was entirely possible Abel heard an unmanly 'eep!' come from his own throat.

"And I tell you what," Cain purred, rubbing his hard-on against both their legs, "this damn _honeymoon surprise_ better involve pantyhose, a can of chocolate sauce, and at_ least_ ten-inches of battery operated fun!"

* * *

There had been a few terrifying days, when he was still too weak to get out of bed, but well enough to think about it, when Encke _wondered_. His favorite personal attribute (not that he'd wasn't proud of his biceps, too) lay between his legs looking lost and forlorn. They'd had to move around all kinds of nerves and nasty things that might have put him permanently out of commission. Wouldn't be fair to make Keeler stay with him in that case; not when he was young and whole and beautiful and could have anyone he wanted.

He worked up the nerve to ask Abe.

"So, uh, after my first accident," Encke started, "for a little while, I, um, couldn't-"

"Get it up?" Abe guessed correctly. He was helping Encke with come thigh strengthening exercises that day in his room.

Encke felt his face burn, but Abe hadn't laughed at him yet, so he looked at him beseechingly.

"You got to try it out," The older man said, making a pumping motion with his hand at his groin. "When you get some alone time, Bud."

Deimos visited later that day and they played cards. Deimos lost spectacularly and ending up owing Encke his first born and the rights to his life story if it ever went to film. They both giggled and laughed so much that Abe had to come in and kick Deimos out.

"Why don't you keep this?" Deimos said before he left. He laid his tablet on the blanket by Encke's hand. "Phobos helped me download a lot of really good games and movies."

His smile was innocent. Encke remembered the day Phobos gave him blood before surgery, and smiled back

"Thanks, Myshonok," he grinned. "I really appreciate it."

The games were a lot of fun.

So were the movies.

* * *

But the real thing was a hundred times better….Keeler was currently straddling his lap backwards as the shower beat down on them both. Encke had a cheek in each hand and a perfect view of his very hard dick disappearing inside Keeler as he rode him up and down. Keeler had a tight grip on the support bar on the wall, levering his sleek, wet body and moaning as quietly as he could.

"Ohh, Baby….!" Encke groaned, trying to keep his voice down and probably failing completely. "You are so sexy; mmm-mm! I'm glad I was stinky tonight!"

Keeler gave a little bark of a laugh in between groaning.

"Ah Ah! Oh sweetheart, I'm sorry…"

Encke panted, helping Keeler move a little faster with his powerful arms. "Don't be sorry, Baby…didn't hurt my-unhh, oh yeah just like that! Feelin's none."

Keeler arched his back, shaking his head as droplets cascaded down his back.

"Oh oh OH! You smelled fine—I lied!"

* * *

"Have a good shower?" Abe said innocently when he did a bedcheck before lights out. Keeler was curled up beside Encke in bed nearly asleep, and at that point, he didn't care if the whole ship had heard them.

Encke smiled. "Better'n a sponge bath from some butt-ugly nurse," he said, feeling sated and content.

Abe smirked. "Yeah, or giving a bed bath to some PIA patient," he laughed. "Doc's kicking you out in the morning, Bud. You gonna be able to walk to your quarters?"

"Yeah, man." Encke stretched out an arm, and shook Abe's hand warmly. "Thanks for everything, Abe. I couldn't have done it without you."

Keeler sat up and shook his hand too. "Thanks for putting up with both of us," he smiled sleepily. "We'll never forget you."

Abe shrugged. "Ah, just name one of the kid's after me someday," he said, his face pink.

Encke nodded. "Yeah; Abe's an okay name. 'Long as we have a boy."

Abe laughed. "Naw, Bud; Abe's for my last name; 'Abraham'."

"Oh yeah?" Encke smiled .

"Sure," the burly nurse replied. "My first name's 'Jack'."

* * *

Keeler lay contentedly against Encke's chest, cradled in his arms after Abe finally left.

"I like Jack for a boy's name," he said, his fingers tracing patterns on Encke's undershirt.

"Me too." Encke pressed a kiss to Keeler's sweet smelling, slightly damp hair. "My mama's name was Kate, 'case we have a girl."

"I like Sophia too," Keeler yawned.

He was almost asleep, when Encke spoke.

"I got you a ring," he said quietly.

Keeler shifted, sat up beside him on the bed and smiled softly. "I know you did, Sweetheart."

Encke shook his head with a scowl. "I didn't figure Abel for havin' as big a mouth as Puck," he muttered, "or I'da picked the little chatterbox to help me right off the bat."

Keeler's smile broadened. "Oh Encke, did you really ask Abel to help you pick out a ring? That's so…..?"

"Romantic?" Encke tried, hopeful. "Um, sweet?"

Keeler rolled his eyes. "Goofy," he laughed.

"Well, don't matter now. Might as well marry_ that_ little shit, since he spoiled your surprise," Encke pouted.

"Hm. Well, Sweetheart; from what I hear Abel already proposed." Keeler leaned over and picked up his jacket from where he'd draped it over the foot of the bed.

"To Cain, or Deimos?"

"Both."

"Poor fool."

Keeler smiled. From a pocket in his jacket, he pulled out the small velvet box with the ring Encke had ordered. Keeler opened it with an unreadable look on his face.

"When the package came, I thought it was for me, so I opened it. I'm sorry, Sweetheart, Abel didn't spoil the surprise, I did."

"That's okay, Baby," Encke said softly. "It was for you anyway."

Keeler looked at him with tears in his eyes, and placed the box in Encke's hand. The box held not one, but two rings.

"No Encke, I thought the box was for me, because….I ordered the same ring, for you."


	19. Epilogue

Epilogue

* * *

James Anthony Morgan is SC's name for Encke, as is Hector for Keeler , both used here with her permission

I walked down the aisle with my husband at our wedding

* * *

Hector Eric Addams and James Anthony Morgan were wed on a beautiful late summer day on Colony 6, three months after the end of the war between the Colteron Empire and the Earth-Mars Federated Alliance. Keeler told everyone it was because he wouldn't get married until his hair was long enough to braid again. Everyone knew it was so Encke could complete his rehabilitation, and walk down the aisle arm and arm with the man he loved.

Mars had once had a vast, deep sea. When it was terraformed, an artificial atmosphere was created and the sea once again lapped against a beach of pale, amber sand. Hector and James—Keeler and Encke to their friends—were married there in the presence of their family and friends. Encke agreed to omit 'obey' from their traditional vows, if Keeler agreed they wouldn't smash wedding cake into each other's face at the reception.

Their honeymoon was on the Kohala Coast on The Big Island of Hawaii, where they stayed for three weeks, wearing almost nothing but a tan.

* * *

One Year Later

* * *

Phobos ran his fingers down the engraved names on the Alliance War Memorial Wall, searching in vain for his brother's name.

"This thing should come with a map," he complained, shivering slightly as the fall breeze blew his silky straw colored hair about his face.

"Taylor, Jackson; Taylor, Jaden…" he shivered, his fingers freezing and his patience wearing thin. "C'mon, Jayce; don't be as big a pain in the ass now as you were when you were alive…."

Two strong arms enveloped him from behind and a solid male body pressed against him from head to toe. Praxis had opened his coat so that it wrapped around Phobos too, sheltering him from the thin October wind.

"Better?" he murmured, pressing a warm, open mouthed kiss to Phobos' neck; making him shiver for another reason altogether.

"Mmm, better," Phobos whispered back. "Just don't let my husband catch us; he's this big Greek stud and he'll probably murder us both."

_Taylor,Jayce; task name Luke; Navigator, 7th Alliance fleet_

Phobos was quiet; staring at his elder brother's name until the letters carved in the smooth, grey wall of stone swam before his eyes.

"How did he die, Kitten?" Praxis asked softly, warm lips close to Phobos ear.

"Like my mother always expected him to," Phobos said bitterly. "Like a goddamn hero."

Praxis kissed his cheek and waited patiently, tasting the salt of his tears and enclosing his icy fingers in his warm hand.

* * *

"Here guys; I found Zelos!" Puck called excitedly. His cheeks and nose were bright pink and his eyes sparkling with tears of laughter and sorrow. They'd been out here for hours, the temperature slowly dropping but no one would stop until everyone had been found.

"Where?" Bazin said excitedly, jogging over with Ethos. "Oh wow, good find, Puck! We just found Kratos; isn't that ironic?"

"Porthos found Nero, and Dante too," Ethos said. He gave a shuddery little sniffle. "And-and I saw Pathos' name not too far from his."

His face crumpled and Puck hugged him, Ethos shaking his head in dismay. "Oh gosh; why I'm crying for that bastard, I have no idea?" he said with a little hiccup.

"Because you thought you loved him once," Bazin said sadly. "Don't feel bad, I cried when I saw my first fighter's name, too."

* * *

_Carrington, Oliver; task name Sporus; navigator; 7th Alliance Fleet_

"Like a lily, that blooms and only lasts one day, _non_?" Oberon said quietly, resting a hand on Porthos' shoulder.

Porthos shrugged. "I guess," he said surprised it hurt so much to see Sporus' name.

"Why are you surprised, my friend?" Oberon said softly, and Porthos could have kicked himself for voicing his feelings aloud.

He snorted. "I fucked him, Oberon. I wasn't in love with him."

"Perhaps, _cheri_. But for those_ terrible_ months, he was in love with you."

* * *

"Juno! I found Juno!"

Deimos and Praxis both ran over at Cain's excited shout.

"_Matthew MacDonald_; yup, that's him."

"Callisto's over here," Abel called, standing next to Keeler who had tears running down his face.

"Ah, for crying out loud," Cain complained. "Can't take the girls anywhere without them blubbering."

He turned back to see if Deimos and Praxis agreed with them, but they were crying, too.

* * *

_Stewart, Caleb; task name Aaron; navigator, 7th Alliance fleet_

Aaron was the last name he found. He'd found Job over an hour ago; _Cohen Jacob,_ but Aaron had been as unobtainable now as he'd been the whole time Encke and he had been lovers.

Not lovers, really, because Aaron had never really loved him. Encke looked over at Keeler, standing alone with his fingers hovering over some text and a sad smile on his lips.

"Who'd you find, Baby?" Encke asked softly.

Keeler turned, wistful and maybe a little guilty too. "Apollo," he said quietly.

Encke walked over to join him, Keeler leaning against his side as Encke slipped an arm around his waist. _Santiago, Estefan_, the text read.

"He never told me his name," Keeler said quietly. "I only found out after he died."

"Did you ever tell him yours?"

Keeler shook his head. "No," he said quietly. "Now that I think of it, I never told him mine, either."

"Hey, everyone!" Puck yelled from the other end of the Wall, hands cupped in front of his mouth. "I'm freezing; who's for cocoa at our place?"

"How 'bout some Hot Toddy's instead?" Cain called gleefully.

"There might be one or two,_ Cheri_."

"Oo and Obie. Do we have stuff to make S'mores?"

"….What is a '_S'mores, cheri_?"

"You up for it, sweetheart?" Keeler asked, looking at Encke with concern. "You've been on your feet an awfully long time."

" 'Least I got feet to be on," Encke smiled. "Yeah, Baby; I'm up for it. Let's go."

* * *

Thank you to everyone who read along with this story and for taking the time to review! Biggest thanks to my friend tjinstlouismo, for kicking me in the butt when I needed it, offering encouragement and listening to me whine. Thank you too SC for putting a link to _Task Name Encke_ on your tumblr ages ago, I'd probably never have written anything else if not for that.

Hamletmachine created and owns Starfighter, and without her generosity towards fans like me there would be no fanfic, fanart or fandom for these incredible characters of hers.


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